No abstract

Recent work from developed parts of the world has documented a positive association between air pollution and criminal activity. We use high-frequency complaints and air pollution data to estimate air pollution’s causal effects on crime in a developing country. In order to establish causality, we exploit plausibly exogenous local variation in wind direction in an instrumental variable setup. We find that a lower number of complaints are received on the days of high air pollution levels. This effect is more pronounced for property crimes than for violent crimes. Our results are robust to a host of robustness checks and falsification checks. Exploring the potential mechanisms, we find that the decline in criminal activity might result from increased costs of indulging in criminal activity.

Using novel data on students' performance on national exams administered during secondary schooling in Tanzania, we study how air pollution exposure on the day of the exam affects student performance on these exams. To uncover causal effects, we leverage plausibly exogenous changes in local wind direction in an Instrumental Variables (IV) setup. Our IV estimates imply that an increase in PM2.5 concentration by 10 µg/m3 on the day a student appears for the exam worsens their performance on the exam by 0.06 standard deviations. Our results are robust to a host of falsification checks. We also document that the effects are more pronounced for younger students, males, students appearing for exams in government schools, and those at the lower end of the achievement distribution. Further, we find that these effects could be driven by adverse effects of air pollution on exams that test fluid intelligence.

Air pollution remains one of the most challenging environmental phenomena. Despite its importance in impacting various facets of everyday life, there is a paucity of well-identified air pollution estimates on short-term outcomes for developing countries. Using novel data, I provide detailed empirical evidence on the direct effect of air pollution on student absenteeism in India by linking local exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) to school attendance. I find a large negative effect of increased air pollution on school attendance. My results are robust to a host of specifications and a battery of robustness checks. Consistent with other works, I find that the effect is more pronounced for younger students and find evidence for differential impacts of air pollution on absenteeism by gender. Exploring the mechanisms behind increased absenteeism, I show that reduced school attendance might be resulting from increased incidence of respiratory ailments in the students exposed to air pollution.