Does College Education Impact Obesity and Smoking? Evidence From the Pre-Lottery Vietnam Draft
- Presenter:
Chair: James Burgess; Discussant: James Burgess Wed June 7, 2006 8:00-9:30 Room 225
The drastic change in drafting rules from the pre-lottery Vietnam draft to the draft lottery creates a discontinuity in postsecondary educational attainment between males of cohorts 1946-1950 and their immediately adjacent cohorts. Unlike cohorts 1942-1944, males of cohorts 1946-1950, who were appropriately aged for both the draft and college, could easily obtain draft deferments by enrolling in college during the high-induction pre-lottery period. For males of cohorts 1951-1953, enrolling in college would no longer exempt them from the draft because of the elimination of college deferments by the draft lottery. Consequently, males’ college education rate rose noticeably for cohorts 1946-1950 and then fell abruptly for cohorts 1951-1953. We exploit this exogenous discontinuity gap in college education to infer a causal effect of education on health.
Using the National Health Interview Survey 1998-2003, we find the pre-lottery Vietnam draft caused approximately a 4-5% increase in college enrollment and 3-4% increase in college completion. We find strong evidence that college completion reduces the probability of obesity and increases the probability of smoking cessation. There is moderate evidence that college completion also reduces the probability of smoking initiation and Type 2 diabetes. The evidence of the impact of college enrollment or associate degree attainment on these health outcomes is moderate to weak.
The economic benefit of college completion, in terms of the reduced probability of smoking and obesity and consequent reduced medical expenditures and productivity losses that are attributable to smoking and obesity, amounts to more than $150,000 lifetime savings total per college graduate, with the lower bound of more than $75,000. The lower bound savings are more than three times the per-student amount of public financing of college education i.e. $22,234, and represent nearly 15% of the lifetime return to a college degree compared to a high school diploma in monetary earnings i.e. $500,000.
