Labor Market Returns to Early Childhood Stimulation : A 20-year Followup to an Experimental Intervention in Jamaica

• Tác giả: James Heckman
• Ngôn ngữ: eng
• Ký hiệu phân loại: 331.12 Labor market
• Thông tin xuất bản: World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013
• Bộ sưu tập: Tài liệu truy cập mở
• ID: 306124
• Chủ đề: 1. ACCOUNTING; 2. ADJUSTMENT; 3. AGING; 4. ANXIETY; 5. ARITHMETIC

Tóm tắt

This paper finds large effects on the earnings of participants from a randomized intervention that gave psychosocial stimulation to stunted Jamaican toddlers living in poverty. The intervention consisted of one-hour weekly visits from community Jamaican health workers over a 2-year period that taught parenting skills and encouraged mothers to interact and play with their children in ways that would develop their children's cognitive and personality skills. The authors re-interviewed the study participants 20 years after the intervention. Stimulation increased the average earnings of participants by 42 percent. Treatment group earnings caught up to the earnings of a matched non-stunted comparison group. These findings show that psychosocial stimulation early in childhood in disadvantaged settings can have substantial effects on labor market outcomes and reduce later life inequality.