Teen Sex, Health Insurance Mandates, and Poutine
Hoisted from Comments: Robert Waldmann writes in from sunny Italy:
Grasping Reality with Both Hands: Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal: I think teen age pregnancy has a small effect on infant mortality.... [T]he raw correlation... is... that infants of teenagers are more likely to die, but teenage mothers are poorer and less likely to get prenatal care than older mothers. When controls for race, income and medical care... [are added] the teenage effect becomes small (on the order of 10% of the baseline risk). See: Arlene Geronimus (1987), "On teenage childbearing and neonatal mortality in the United States," Population & Development Review 13(2):323-334.... [T]he factor stressed by Mankiw turns out to be less important than the ones he claims are not critical when they go head to head in a regression.
You are, of course, correct that difference across developed countries in teenage fertility are not explained by differences in sexual activity (which are small: median age of first intercourse is around 16 everywhere) but rather in contraceptive use.
Of course you are much more expert than Mankiw on the first topic you discuss (sorry I really really couldn't resist). More generally, Mankiw seems to be blaming the uninsured for their lack of insurance. Odd that he is opposed to mandating insurance given that view.
With respect to Canada's ability to deliver extremely calorie-dense foods incredibly cheaply, all I can say is: Poutine!
With respect to mandates: yes. If the principal market failure in health care is indeed (as Mankiw seems to say) that people can freeload off of others and still get treated when they get sick, then mandated insurance purchase is the efficiency-maximizing road to take.
