Finding the Benefits: Estimating the Impact of The South African Child Support Grant |
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Authors: | Marisa Coetzee |
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Institution: | Department of Economics, University of Stellenbosch, , 7600 South Africa |
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Abstract: | This paper estimates the impact of the South African Child Support Grant (CSG) on child health, nutrition and education. Data from the 2008 South African National Income Dynamics Study are used to estimate the impact of the CSG on six different outcomes measuring child well‐being. We find a positive treatment effect of the CSG on children's height‐for‐age, progress through the school system, as well as household expenditure on food items using a continuous treatment estimator developed by Hirano and Imbens. Robustness analysis using the inverse probability weighting approach by Flores and Mitnik is also implemented. Although these estimates provide some evidence of a positive impact resulting from the CSG, they are not conclusive in showing that the cash transfers are spent mainly on improving the lives of beneficiary children, as the treatment effects are quite small. |
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Keywords: | I38 H53 C21 D13 Conditional cash transfers child health and nutrition continuous treatment estimator South Africa |
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