Does College Education Impact Adult Morbidities? Evidence From Pre-Lottery Vietnam War Draft

1. Does College Education Impact Adult Morbidities?Evidence From Pre-Lottery Vietnam War Draft Bo MacInnisInstitute for Social ResearchUniversity of Michigan

2. Motivations • Health behaviors and morbidities as potential mechanisms for • Understanding education-mortality relation • Curbing rising health care costs • College education • Steepest gradient observed • Steady decline in males’ college enrollment

4. Education-Health Gradient Author’s calculations from NHIS 1998-2003

5. Enrollment rate: females Card & Lemieux 2000

6. Enrollment rate: males

7. Education-Health Literature • Instruments for college education • Arkes (2001): Unemployment rate. Reduce work-limiting health conditions • Currie and Moretti (2003): College opening. Increases infant’s birth weight • Lleras-Muney (2002), Adams (2002): Compulsory school law. Reduces mortality; increases good health • Kenkel etc. (2006): K-12 education policy. High school graduation reduces smoking.

8. Smoking & College Education • De Walque (2004), Grimard & Parent (2005) • Vietnam War draft: Card and Lemieux (2001) • Reduce smoking initiation • No evidence on smoking cessation • Contributions • Discontinuity research design • Endogenous effect of veteran status

9. Annual Number of Inductions

10. A Quasi-Natural Experiment • Pre-lottery draft: 1965-1969 • Most draftees were aged 19-22 • Deferments were easily obtainable • College attendance • Children and other family hardship • High inductions • Consequence for males of cohorts 1945-50

11. A Quasi-Natural Experiment (cont.) • Draft lottery institutionalized in 1970 • Random Sequence Number (RSN) • 1970 lottery for cohorts 1946-50 • 1971-3 lottery for cohort 1951-3 respectively • Much reduced inductions • College deferments effectively eliminated • Consequence to males of cohorts 1951-1953

12. Induction Risks and College Education

13. Induction Risks and Male-Female Difference in College Education

14. Treatment Exposure

15. Data • National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) 1998-2003 • Personal characteristics (veteran status) • Health outcomes: chronic conditions • Lifestyle behaviors: smoking • Body weight and height • Base sample • Males and females U.S. born of birth cohorts 1942-1953, sample size = 30,158

16. Smoking Initiation and Cessation

17. BMI Distributions: Gender & College

18. BMI Distributions: Gender & College

19. Estimation Health = b*educ + b1*veteran + X*B + b2*trend + error • Linear probability model for educ, veteran, health • IV for educ = male * cohorts 1946-1950 • IV for veteran = male * draft age eligibility • Difference of age in 1967 and 19 (quartic terms) • trend = no/linear/quadratic trend • X = age, gender, race, survey year, and interactions • Two-stage least square estimation

20. First Stage: College Education sample = U.S. born males and females of cohorts 1942-1953; sample size = 30,158; standard errors are in parentheses. ***, **, *: significant at 1%, 5%, 10%.

21. Estimates of the Impact of College on Morbidities **: p < .05

22. Robustness Checks • Control for linear, and quadratic trend • Use various measures of induction risk as instruments for schooling and veteran • Avoidance choices besides going to college • Emigrate to Canada – sample selection issue • Become delinquent • Obtain dependency deferments

23. Canadian Emigrants & Delinquents

24. Live Births by Year

25. Live Births by Treatment Status

26. Marriages by Year

27. Concluding Remarks • Quasi-natural experiment & RDD • strong instrument for college education • Return to college includes a reduction in • smoking, obesity, and diabetes • Policy implications • Increase college enrollment/completion rates