Distinguished Lecture in Economics: Child Health as Human Capital

Child health is increasingly understood to be a critical form of human capital, but only recently have we begun to understand how valuable it is and how better to support its development. This lecture provides an overview of recent work demonstrating the key role of public insurance in supporting longer-term human capital development, and pointing to improvements in child mental health as an especially important mechanism.

Join us to hear Janet Currie, Henry Putnam Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University.

About the Lecturer

Janet Currie is a pioneer in the economic analysis of child development and its role in the development of social inequalities. Her work has been instrumental in demonstrating the long-term impacts of early life childhood intervention programs, health insurance coverage, and pollution exposure. Currie is the co-director of the National Bureau of Economic Research’s Program on Children and Families. She is the in-coming President of the American Society of Health Economics and has served as the Vice President of the American Economic Association. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, the Society of Labor Economists, and of the Econometric Society and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine and of the American Academy of Art and Sciences. Currie has honorary degrees from the University of Lyon and the University of Zurich. In 2016 she was awarded the Carolyn Shaw Bell award for mentorship by the American Economic Association. Currie’s research currently focuses on socioeconomic differences in health and access to health care, environmental threats to health, and the important role of mental health.

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The Faculty of Arts gratefully acknowledges our Economics alumni for their generous support of the Distinguished Lecture Series:

• Brian Lipskie of Benjamin Lipskie Investments Inc.*
• Karen J. Henderson
• Dominic Y. Leung*
• Thomas E. Scott of T. E. Scott Professional Corporation*

*gifts of $1,000 or more