Assessing individual, community, and financial factors in birth outcomes and associated health disparities

近年来，美国各地的城市和县都通过了当地的最低工资政策（LMW）， 将最低工资标准提高到每小时15美元以上，以缩小不断扩大的差距。 在联邦最低工资门槛和当地生活成本之间。这些低分子量物质提高了风险 对于回答有关最低工资上涨影响的悬而未决的问题， 特别是这种规模的增长，对人口健康的最早的前身。换句话说， 最低工资，特别是低最低工资，导致低收入家庭的经济福利增加， 这些政策是否有助于缓解机会不平等， 他们实际上已经减少甚至负面影响的个人和社区， 历史上经历过的歧视;这些最低工资的变化是否会产生类似的模式， 扩大或缩小在某些经济结果上的分歧，而不是其他表明这些 成果将政策与扩大或缩小生育结果方面的社会不平等联系起来。使用来自 美国生命统计监测系统出生证明登记处和当前人口调查，这 项目旨在（1）检查最低工资政策，特别是LMW（城市和县）的影响， 出生结果的变化;（2）确定这些政策对出生结果的影响是否被修改， 个体和群体特征（即，母亲的种族/民族和出生地，劳动力市场条件， （3）在香港居住的居民，在居住的机会不平等）或社区受政策影响的时间长短;及 评估最低工资政策，特别是最低工资政策对经济成果的影响（例如， 收入、贫困、医疗保险、失业），以及这些影响在不同地区的潜在异质性。 团体和地方，有助于解释社会经济机制，通过最低工资政策 影响生育结果。该项目通过调整和扩展尖端的准实验性 技术来构建一个有效的反事实控制，如果没有变化， 最低工资政策。总之，拟议的项目解决了几个非常重要，但研究不足， 最低工资政策对健康的影响。这项工作的结果也将对更广泛的 关于劳动力市场政策干预健康的社会决定因素的潜力的问题， 改善产前和婴儿健康，这可以为身体健康提供终身和代际福利， 健康和社会经济成果。

In recent years, cities and counties across the U.S. have passed local minimum wage policies (LMW) that set minimum wage standards to upwards of 15 dollars per hour or more in an effort to close widening gaps between federal minimum wage thresholds and local cost of living. These LMW have raised the stakes considerably for answering outstanding questions about the impact of minimum wage increases, and particularly increases of this magnitude, on the earliest antecedents of population health. Namely, do changes in minimum wages – and particularly LMW– lead to gains in low-income families' economic wellbeing that can be observed as improvements in birth outcomes; do these policies help alleviate inequality of opportunity or do they actually have diminished or even negative consequences for individuals and communities that have historically experienced discrimination; and do these changes in minimum wages produce similar patterns of widening or narrowing differences on some economic outcomes and not others that suggests that these outcomes link the policies to widening or narrowing social inequalities in birth outcomes. Using microdata from the U.S. Vital Statistics Surveillance System birth certificate registries and Current Population Survey, this project aims to (1) examine the effect of minimum wage policy, and particularly LMW (city and county), on change in birth outcomes; (2) determine whether effects of these policies on birth outcomes are modified by individual and community characteristics (i.e., mother's race/ethnicity and nativity, labor market conditions and residential inequality of opportunity) or the duration of the community's exposure to the policies; and (3) evaluate whether the impact of minimum wage policies, and LMW in particular on economic outcomes (e.g., income, poverty, health insurance, unemployment), and the potential heterogeneity of these impacts across groups and localities, help explain the socioeconomic mechanisms through which minimum wage policy impacts birth outcomes. The project innovates by adapting and extending cutting-edge quasi-experimental techniques to construct a valid counterfactual control for what would have happened in absence of a change in minimum wage policy. In sum, the proposed project addresses several highly significant, but understudied, questions about the health effects of minimum wage policy. Findings from this work will also speak to broader questions about the potential for labor market policies to intervene on social determinants of health, potentially improving prenatal and infant health, which can provide life-long and intergenerational benefits for physical health and socioeconomic outcomes.