ESSAYS ON COLLEGE TRANSFER IN THE U.S. AND CHILDREN'S WELFARE IN CHINA
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Date
2013-10-10
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Johns Hopkins University
Abstract
This dissertation studies college transfer in U.S. and children's welfare in China. In Chapter 2, I develop and estimate a two-period ability-learning structural model to analyze the determinants and consequences of college transfer. Students make college entry and transfer decisions under different financial constraints and uncertainty about their abilities. In period 1, students choose between community colleges and universities, and in period 2, they make transfer decisions. I estimate the structural parameters of the model using data from the Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study (BPS:04/09), with simulated maximum likelihood. I further examine the extent to which the effectiveness of the transfer function of community colleges can be improved with three counterfactual experiments. They included increasing university tuition costs, eliminating transfer costs, and increasing academic preparedness. The experiments suggest that transfer costs are the main barrier to college transfer.
Chapter 3 studies the impact of labor migration on children's health in China. Labor migration, which frequently results in family separations, is widely known as one of the main ways of alleviating poverty in developing countries. In China, migrant workers helped build the Chinese dream in cities across the country. But for their children, who are left behind in the countryside, the potential health problems of their physical and social development is becoming a national issue. This study uses data collected as part of the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) in 2000, 2004, 2006, and 2009 to identify the impact of parents' migration on the health outcomes of children in rural China. The measurements of child health outcomes are weight-for-age Z-score (WAZ), height-for-age Z-score (HAZ), nutrient intake (consumption of calories and protein), the number of immunization shots that children get in the survey year and child-care. To identify the effect of parental migration on child health, we instrumented parents' migration status with county level historical average migration rates. We found there were few significant effects of parents' migration on child health outcomes.
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College transfer, tuition, uncertainty, Bayesian inference, heterogeneity, children's health, labor migration, fixed effects model