Department of Economics Seminar Series - Shreya Bhardwaj (USC)
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You are invited to the Economics Department Seminar Series. Our second talk of the series will be this Friday, April 10, from 11:00am-12:00pm in SSPA-204. The speaker will be Shreya Bhardwaj who will present a paper entitled "When Quality Counts: Early Childhood Regulation and the Long-Run Development of Human Capital".
Shreya is a PhD Candidate at USC. She is an applied microeconomist working at the intersection of labor and public economics. Her research examines how social safety net programs shape economic inequality, with a particular focus on the care economy.
Shreya's talk will investigate the effects of more stringent childcare laws on adult income. She finds that adults' earnings improve with stricter childcare regulations, but these benefits are concentrated among middle-class earners, leaving low-income earners behind. She then suggests amendments to existing policies that can benefit low-income earners. Please see the abstract below for more details.
"This paper provides the first evidence on the long-run effects of stricter childcare regulations, exploiting the staggered adoption of child-to-staff ratio and director education requirements across 31 U.S. states from 1984-1994. Using a difference-in-differences design, I find that exposure to these regulations in early childhood raises annual adult income by approximately $1,400 (2.5%). The gains operate through intensive human capital accumulation—raising graduate and professional degree attainment and high-paying employment—without increasing the likelihood of college attendance or labor force participation. However, these benefits are not universal. The effects are concentrated among the middle-class earners and are significantly smaller for individuals from economically disadvantaged states, underscoring that quality regulations can yield lasting returns but risk leaving behind those least able to access improved care."
More information concerning this and other presentations for this semester can be found on the Economics Department website (https://www.csulb.edu/college-of-liberal-arts/economics/economic-seminar-series).
