Socioeconomic Determinants of Children’s Health in Russia: A Longitudinal Study

This article explores dynamic links among the health status of children, measured by standardized height, socioeconomic characteristics of their parents and communities, and related shocks, using a 4‐period‐long panel of children from Russia's Longitudinal Monitoring Survey. Specific attention is given to the endogenous effect of lagged height on current height, which can be thought of as the catch‐up effect or the lingering effect of poor health. We find that while such an effect is significant, it is substantially smaller than that typically found in the literature. It is also shown that exploring the dynamic relationship between health and socioeconomic factors allows for a better understanding of the impacts of time‐varying socioeconomic variables on child growth.