SSCI/SCOPUS Publications
[1] Long-Run Mental Health Impact of the Korean War. Seoul Journal of Economics, December 2017, 30 (4): 431-453.
In this study, we investigate whether exposure to a major civil war has a long-run impact on the mental health of individuals who experienced the war in late childhood. We use difference-in-differences strategy and exploit geographic variations in the intensity of the Korean War using Korean Longitudinal Study of Aging. War exposure in late childhood to early teenage years has a long-run negative impact on variables related to mental health, including depression, fear, insomnia, and loneliness. The effect is exacerbated by poverty and household structure for two outcome variables: fear and loneliness.
[2] Mental Health Cost of Terrorism: Study of the Charlie Hebdo Attack in Paris (with Dongyoung Kim). Health Economics, 2017;0:1-14. https://doi.org/10.1002/hec.3520
This paper examines whether a terrorist attack in a developed country without a major damage to its capital stocks affect mental health of the residents of target country. By exploiting the variations in survey dates of European Social Survey (ESS), we use difference-in-differences strategy to show that the attack adversely affects subjective well-being and mental health measures of French respondents. These negative effects are stronger for the immigrants and the single people. The impact is less dramatic for politically extreme right-wing supporters. The distance from the origin and residency in border countries have little impact on the measures.
[3] Pronatalist Cash Grant and Fertility: A Panel Analysis (with Sok Chul Hong, Jae-Young Lim, and Mee-Young Yeo). The Korean Economic Review, December 2016, 32 (2): 331-354.
Exploiting the variation in baby bonus amount per birth parity of the 255 municipal districts in South Korea, we estimate the impact of cash grant on fertility. The use of over 15,000 district-by-month level baby bonus dataset per parity of birth enables us to control county fixed effects and to perform GMM method to identify causal link between the price of marginal child and fertility. We find a statistically significant and positive impact of cash grant on crude birth rate. We also find that the implied grant amount necessary to instigate extra birth varies by birth parity. We also find that there is a significant quantum effect – the effect on the total number of children – through sub-group analysis by female age.
[4] The Long-Run Impact of Traumatic Experience on Risk Aversion (with Jungmin Lee). Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, December 2014, 108: 174-186.
We examine the long-run impact of exposure to a traumatic event on risk attitudes. We estimate risk aversion of those who experienced the Korean War at different ages to identify a sensitive period for risk attitude formation. This major war broke out suddenly, and the impact of the war on civilians was substantial but limited to a brief period of time. The results reveal that individuals who were 4–8 years old during the peak of the war are more risk averse about five decades later. Furthermore, within the affected cohorts, those who resided in more severely damaged provinces are more risk averse.
[5] Lifetime Impact of Cash Transfer on Fertility. Canadian Studies in Population, April 2014, 41 (1-2): 97-110.
In most OECD countries, fertility level is below the natural generation replacement level, and many OECD countries implement pro-natal policies, including direct cash transfer schemes. However, evaluations of the long-run impact of such policies are surprisingly rare. We investigate whether the cash transfer increases completed fertility, exploiting a quasi-experiment from a pro-natal cash transfer called Allowance for Newborn Children (ANC). We first devise a measure of ANC impact for different birth cohorts, because the policy lasted for a decade and affected cohorts with different intensities at different ages. The results show that ANC impact on fertility has little permanent component.
[6] Estimating Risk Aversion Using Individual-Level Survey Data (with Jungmin Lee). The Korean Economic Review, December 2012, 28 (2): 221-239.
Attitude towards risk can be an important factor in explaining various economic decisions, such as the choice of self-employment. As a first step towards understanding the prevalence of self-employment in South Korea, we structurally estimate risk aversion parameters based on the standard expected utility theory. We use hypothetical lottery questions from a large-scale longitudinal survey (the Korean Labor and Income Panel Study) conducted in two waves to a sample of approximately 8,000 individuals. The estimation results show that the constant relative risk aversion parameter ranges from 0.6 to 0.8: male, younger, less educated, unmarried and higher income individuals are less risk averse. Erroneous responses are more likely for male, younger, more educated and poorer respondents. We also find significant impact of responses to the hypothetical questions on self-employment, which suggests that our estimates for risk preferences are likely predictive of actual choice of self-employment.
KCI Publications
[7] Terrorism and Population Characteristic: Impact of Charlie Hebdo Shooting on Trust (with Dongyoung Kim). Korea Journal of Population Studies, March 2017, 40 (1): 107-126.
We study the impact of Charlie Hebdo shooting on trust of French residents using the European Social Survey (ESS). This paper uses the difference-in-differences method to identify the impact of the terrorist attack on trust attitudes, exploiting the survey dates to differentiate the treatment group from the control group. French residents are more likely to have more favorable attitudes towards four different measure of trust: trust for people; government; parliament and police. The results are qualitatively robust to regression discontinuity design. We find that subgroups by immigration, cohabiting and income respond differently to the shooting.
[8] The Impact of Family Planning Program in Lowering Fertility. Korean Journal of Labor Economics, June 2014, 37 (2): 105-121.
Since the end of the World War II, the population explosion of developing countries has been a global concern. However, the impact of family planning program effort to reduce fertility is difficult to measure, as the effort level is endogenously determined. This paper studies if the family planning program impact is substantial and statistically significant in fertility reduction using fixed effect analysis. The fixed effect estimate shows that there is little impact of family planning program effort on fertility. Only the higher income countries showed significant negative impact.
[9] Impact of Pre-Marital Pregnancy on Birth Outcome: Evidence from South Korea (with Pyung Gang Kim). Korea Review of Applied Economics, December 2012, 14(3): 209-238.
Proportion of shotgun birth is rapidly increasing in South Korea. Using the complete birth records of Korea from 1997 to 2009, we study the impact of shotgun birth and out-of-wedlock birth on birth outcome. The decrease in normal births is almost entirely replaced by shotgun births. We find that premarital pregnancy impact, especially shotgun birth impact, on birth weight and low birth weight probability is either statistically insignificant or economically insignificant. Therefore the impact of rapidly increasing shotgun birth of South Korea on birth outcome is trivial.
[10] Impact of Direct Cash Transfer on Fertility by Income and Education Subgroup: Study of Allowance for Newborn Children of Canada, Korea Journal of Population Studies, December 2012, 35 (3): 29-55.
Total fertility rates of most OECD member nations are below replacement level. In an effort to increase its fertility, many OECD countries implement pro-natal policies targeted at reducing child rearing cost, thus making children more affordable to households. This paper investigates if certain group of population is more sensitive to cash transfer schemes, exploiting quasi-experimental property of a universal cash transfer that lasted for a decade in Quebec, Canada. Whether lowering childrearing cost has significant impact on increasing fertility is an empirical question, as the impact depends on the number of households at the margin who stopped fertility due to financial constraint less than or equal to the subsidy amount. The result indicates that lowest income group is the most sensitive to pro-natal cash transfers and the impact decreases as the income increases.