TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Gensowski, Miriam
AU  - Nielsen, Torben Heien
AU  - Nielsen, Nete Munk
AU  - Rossin-Slater, Maya
AU  - Wüst, Miriam
        TI  - Childhood Health Shocks, Comparative Advantage, and Long-Term Outcomes: Evidence from the Last Danish Polio Epidemic
        PY  - 2018/Jun/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 11630
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp11630
        AB  - A large literature documents that childhood health shocks have lasting negative consequences for adult outcomes. This paper demonstrates that the adversity of childhood physical disability can be mediated by individuals' educational and occupational choices, which reflect their comparative advantage. We merge records on children hospitalized with poliomyelitis during the 1952 Danish epidemic to census and administrative data, and exploit quasi-random variation in paralysis incidence. While childhood disability increases the likelihood of early retirement and disability pension receipt at age 50, paralytic polio survivors obtain higher education and are more likely to work in white-collar and computer-demanding jobs than their non-paralytic counterparts.
        KW  - childhood health shocks
KW  - occupational sorting
KW  - comparative advantage
KW  - long-term effects
        ER  -