Neighborhood Sanitation and Infant Mortality / Michael Geruso, Dean Spears.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Geruso, Michael.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Spears, Dean.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w21184.

NBER working paper series no. w21184

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2015.

Summary:

In this paper, we shed new light on a long-standing puzzle: In India, Muslim children are substantially more likely than Hindu children to survive to their first birthday, even though Indian Muslims have lower wealth, consumption, educational attainment, and access to state services. Contrary to the prior literature, we show that the observed mortality advantage accrues not to Muslim households themselves but rather to their neighbors, who are also likely to be Muslim. Investigating mechanisms, we provide a collage of evidence suggesting externalities due to poor sanitation are a channel linking the religious composition of neighborhoods to infant mortality.

Notes:

Print version record

May 2015.