Abstract
We demonstrate that improving the early childhood health environment has long-term and inter-generational effects on human capital. We take advantage of a basic public health program in Matlab Bangladesh, which included childhood vaccinations such as measles, that was quasi-randomly placed into treatment and comparison areas. We show adults who were eligible for the program as children exhibit increased height and achieved higher levels of educational attainment. Findings are largest for individuals with the lowest pre-program health endowment, revealing a 50% reduction in short-stature and 0.2 SD increase in cognition, reducing disadvantage across generations. Intergenerational analysis reveals that daughters of eligible, compared to ineligible, mothers were taller, less likely to be stunted, and had higher cognition. These effects are correlated with mother’s agriculture income generation activities. While the direct impacts on eligible children are substantial, the intergenerational effects demonstrate how early health investments continue to yield returns across generations. These findings suggest that cost-benefit analyses of early childhood health programs that ignore long-term or intergenerational effects underestimate their full returns.