Evaluating the impact of conditional cash transfer programs on adolescent decisions about marriage and fertility: The case of Oportunidades.

摘要

This dissertation analyzes the effect of conditional cash transfers on adolescent decisions about marriage and fertility. I use data from the 2002-2004 evaluation study of the urban Oportunidades program, which is a nationwide antipoverty intervention in Mexico that aims to improve education, health, and nutrition through conditional cash transfers and health education. The data used are nonexperimental, and program participation is not randomly assigned. To avoid the problem of selection bias, treatment is defined as the offer of Oportunidades, and I focus on intent-to-treat parameters, measuring the program impact on outcomes related to fertility and marriage. In contrast with previous evaluation studies, I adopt a multistate hazard modeling approach to evaluate the program's effect on the timing of first sexual experience, first marriage, and first and second births by adolescents. Baseline duration dependence in this model is captured by flexible splines transformation. The model allows for the timing of events to depend on the timing of previous events and incorporates unobservables in the form of a permanent unobserved component that enters into the different equations with factor loadings. I find that Oportunidades significantly delays the onset of premarital sex. Young women living in intervention areas marry much later and as a consequence delay significantly their first and second children. In general, I find that hazard modeling approach proves to be a useful way of discerning program effects.