What is the Added Value of Preschool for Poor Children? Long-Term and Intergenerational Impacts and Interactions with an Infant Health Intervention

Abstract

We study the impact of preschool targeted at children from low-income families over the life cycle and across generations, and examine its interaction with an infant health intervention. Using Danish administrative data with variation in the timing of program implementation over 1933-1960, we find lasting benefits of access to preschool on adult educational attainment, earnings, and survival beyond age 65. We also show that children of women exposed to preschool obtain more education by age 25. However, exposure to nurse home visiting in infancy reduces the added value of preschool. This result implies that the programs serve as partial substitutes.