Does democracy make taller men? Cross-country European evidence.

Publisher: Elsevier Science Country of Publication: Netherlands NLM ID: 101166135 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1873-6130 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 1570677X NLM ISO Abbreviation: Econ Hum Biol Subsets: MEDLINE

Original Publication: Amsterdam ; New York : Elsevier Science, c2003-

Body Height* ; Democracy*; Adolescent ; Adult ; Child, Preschool ; Communism ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Parturition ; Pregnancy

We study whether a democracy improves a measure of individual wellbeing: human heights. Drawing on individual-level datasets, we test the democracy and height hypothesis using a battery of eight different measures of democracy and we account for several potential confounders, regional and cohort fixed effects. We document that democracy - or its quality during early childhood - shows a strong and positive conditional correlation with male, but not female, adult stature. Our preferred estimates suggest that being born in a democracy increases average male stature from a minimum of 1.33 to a maximum of 2.4 cm. We also show a positive association when democracy increases from childhood to adolescence, and when we adopt measures of existing democratic capital before birth, and at the end of height plasticity in early adulthood. We also document that democracy is associated with a reduction in inequality of heights distribution. Our estimates are driven by period-specific heterogeneity, namely, early democratizations are associated with taller people more than later ones. Results are robust to the inclusion of countries exposed to communism.
(Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Keywords: Communism; Democracy; Europe; Human heights; Survey data; Waves of democratization; Wellbeing

Date Created: 20220222 Date Completed: 20220505 Latest Revision: 20220505

20240104

10.1016/j.ehb.2022.101117

35193042