Mentor/s
Professor Khawaja Mamun
Abstract
This research paper explores the effect of air pollution on life expectancy. While prior studies have presented a heavily supported link between long-term exposure to air pollution and harmful effects on health, most of these studies are based on single country data. The objective of this paper is to fill the gap in the literature by conducting a cross-country study. The paper evaluates the effect of average air pollution on life expectancy across 111 countries between 2010 and 2015. The additional control variables that were used include GDP per capita, percentage of people with access to water, population density, health care expenditure (in terms of GDP), and the GINI index (a measure of inequality). This study finds a negative association between average exposure to air pollution and life expectancy. Specifically, I estimate that for every additional mean microgram per cubic meter of PM2.5 air pollution exposure, life expectancy reduces by 0.04, years on average.
College and Major available
Business Economics
Location
Panel D: UC 106
Start Day/Time
4-21-2017 2:00 PM
End Day/Time
4-21-2017 3:15 PM
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Air Pollution and Life Expectancy
Panel D: UC 106
This research paper explores the effect of air pollution on life expectancy. While prior studies have presented a heavily supported link between long-term exposure to air pollution and harmful effects on health, most of these studies are based on single country data. The objective of this paper is to fill the gap in the literature by conducting a cross-country study. The paper evaluates the effect of average air pollution on life expectancy across 111 countries between 2010 and 2015. The additional control variables that were used include GDP per capita, percentage of people with access to water, population density, health care expenditure (in terms of GDP), and the GINI index (a measure of inequality). This study finds a negative association between average exposure to air pollution and life expectancy. Specifically, I estimate that for every additional mean microgram per cubic meter of PM2.5 air pollution exposure, life expectancy reduces by 0.04, years on average.
