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Abstract:
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People with low incomes experience higher mortality and morbidity on average than the more affluent, even while controlling for health factors such as access to care, and drinking and smoking. One hypothesis that may explain this difference is the fetal origins hypothesis, a theory pioneered by David Barker, who argues that poor maternal health can harm a fetus' development, compromising the child's health into adulthood. Barker suggests that women of low socioeconomic class are less likely to have healthy pregnancies due to environmental factors and lifestyle behaviors. As a result, children of low-income women, who are more likely to be low-income themselves, will suffer worse lifelong health outcomes. To measure how much explanatory power the fetal origins hypothesis holds for health differentials, I use the 2001 Panel Study of Income Data to run two separate regressions on adults aged 30 or over. Both have the dependent variable of health status and independent variables related to socioeconomic status (SES) and lifestyle characteristics that affect health. The second regression also has an indicator of healthy fetal development. In comparing the effect of SES on health across these two regressions, the effect of wealth on health does not change with the introduction of the fetal development variable, which sheds doubt on the ability of the fetal origins hypothesis to explain the health-wealth gradient. However, the effect of birth weight on adult health is significant, which suggests that improved prenatal care may improve adult health outcomes over the long term. |