Abstract：
Which children are most vulnerable when their government imposes austerity? Research tends to focus on either the political-economic level or the family level. Using a sample of nearly two million children in 67 countries, this study synthesizes theories from family sociology and political science to examine the heterogeneous effects on child poverty of economic shocks following the implementation of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) program. To discover effect heterogeneity, we apply machine learning to policy evaluation. We find that children\'s average probability of falling into poverty increases by 14 percentage points. We find substantial effect heterogeneity, with family wealth and governments\' education spending as the two most important moderators. In contrast to studies that emphasize the vulnerability of low-income families, we find that middle-class children face an equally high risk of poverty. Our results show that synthesizing family and political factors yield deeper knowledge of how economic shocks affect children.
摘要：
当政府实施紧缩政策时，哪些孩子最脆弱？研究往往集中在政治经济层面或家庭层面。使用67个国家近200万儿童的样本，本研究综合了家庭社会学和政治学的理论，以研究国际货币基金组织（IMF）计划实施后经济冲击对儿童贫困的异质影响。为了发现效应异质性，我们将机器学习应用于策略评估。我们发现，儿童陷入贫困的平均概率增加了14个百分点。我们发现了实质性的效应异质性，家庭财富和政府的教育支出是两个最重要的调节因素。与强调低收入家庭脆弱性的研究相反，我们发现中产阶级儿童面临同样高的贫困风险。我们的结果表明，综合家庭和政治因素可以更深入地了解经济冲击如何影响儿童。
