Surface Water Pollution and Infant Mortality in China

Economic Development and Cultural Change, 2016, Vol. 65(1), pp. 119-139.

The Effect of Air Pollution on Mortality: Evidence from the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games

Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 2016, Vol. 79, pp. 18-39.

By exploiting exogenous variations in air quality during the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, we estimate the effect of air pollution on mortality in China. We find that a 10 percent decrease in PM10 concentrations reduces the monthly standardized all-cause mortality rate by 8 percent. Men and women are equally susceptible to air pollution risks. The age groups for which the air pollution effects are greatest are children under 10 years old and the elderly.

Growth, Pollution, and Life Expectancy: China from 1991-2012

American Economic Review (P&P), 2015, Vol. 105(5), pp. 226-231.

Evidence on the Impact of Sustained Exposure to Air Pollution on Life Expectancy from China’s Huai River Policy

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2013, 110(32): 12936-12941.

This paper’s findings suggest that an arbitrary Chinese policy that greatly increases total suspended particulates (TSPs) air pollution is causing the 500 million residents of Northern China to lose more than 2.5 billion life years of life expectancy. The quasi-experimental empirical approach is based on China’s Huai River policy, which provided free winter heating via the provision of coal for boilers in cities north of the Huai River but denied heat to the south. Using a regression discontinuity design based on distance from the Huai River, we find that ambient concentrations of TSPs are about 184 μg/m3 [95% confidence interval (CI): 61, 307] or 55% higher in the north. Further, the results indicate that life expectancies are about 5.5 y (95% CI: 0.8, 10.2) lower in the north owing to an increased incidence of cardiorespiratory mortality. More generally, the analysis suggests that long-term exposure to an additional 100 μg/m3 of TSPs is associated with a reduction in life expectancy at birth of about 3.0 y (95% CI: 0.4, 5.6).