Chapter 7 - Parental education and children's health throughout life

Abstract

Socio-economic differences in health and health-related behaviors can be pivotal to understand socio-economic inequalities in education and labor market outcomes. The education of parents is an important, if not the most important, characteristic to describe children’s socio-economic background. Increased parental education substantially changes the environment in which children grow up, it changes the investments into children, and these changes start to happen early in children’s life. This chapter summarizes the literature on effects of parental education on children’s health. It answers questions like: Does parental education impact children’s health? Does mothers’ or fathers’ education matter for children’s health? At what age of children does parental education matter? What are potential transmission mechanisms? Overall, intergenerational effects of education on health prove to be substantial and important. A significant part of the intergenerational transmission of socio-economic status may therefore work through the impact of parental education on children’s health.