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by school, are unlikely to push their children to achieve higher levels of educational attainment.
Heckman and Masterov state further that poorly educated teenage mothers are also likely to have
children who participate in crime. It is therefore of potentially great importance that society offer
all children the opportunity to gain the educational tools that will benefit them in the future, as
the benefits will extend far beyond their private returns and help society as a whole.
iv. Health
Education also plays a role in health. Education makes people aware of the importance of
good nutrition, the danger of smoking, and the benefits of making healthier lifestyle choices.
Ross and Wu (1995) examined the links between education and health in three areas: work and
economic conditions, social-psychological resources, and health lifestyle. They found that well
educated people reported better physical functioning9 and a better sense of control over their
lives and health than poorly educated people.
Work and economic conditions were shown to affect health as people who reported to
have suffered from economic hardship10 reported poorer levels of health. Economic hardship was
highest among those who did not graduate high school. People with above average educational
attainment and who were employed reported to have the highest level of health, (Ross and Wu
(1995:722). These findings substantiate the view that education plays a part in improving health.
Individuals with higher incomes, who generally are well educated, report better health
than those with lower levels of income. Holzer et al. (2007) estimated that poverty raises the
direct expenditures on health care by about $22 billion a year in the United States. Therefore
increasing levels of education and giving people the skills to help them reduce their levels of
poverty will in turn help them improve their health status. This would lead to direct benefits from
a reduction in both private and public healthcare spending. Thus, the gains related to better
health would be felt by both private individuals and the public in general.
The impact that education has on health, though, is due to much more than higher
income. Ross and Hubert (1985) find that poorly educated people, even at the same income level
as well educated people, experience greater health hardship. This may be associated with the fact
that low educational attainment is associated with higher rates of infectious disease, many
chronic non-infectious diseases, self-reported poorer health, shorter survival when sick and
shorter life expectancy.
9 Physical functioning deals with self-reports of physical mobility and functioning in daily activities. The physical
function was measured using an index of seven questions. — How much difficulty do you have (1) going up and
down stairs; (2) kneeling or stooping; (3) lifting or carrying objects less than 10 pounds, like a bag of groceries; (4)
using your hands or fingers; (5) seeing, even with glasses; (6) hearing; (7) walking?” Respondents then answered
these questions with either ‘a great deal of difficulty’, ‘some difficulty’ or ‘no difficulty’.
10 Ross and Wu‘s measured economic hardship from the responses to three questions posed. —During the past twelve
months, how often did it happen that you (1) did not have enough money to buy food, clothes or other things your
household needed; (2) did not have enough money to pay for medical care; and (3) had trouble paying bills?”
Respondents answered each question either ‘never’, ‘not very often’, ‘fairly often’ or ‘very often’. The economic
hardship index is the mean response to the three questions.