The primary goal of pollution abatement is to protect human health, but there is still much debate about the specific health
effects.
This paper addresses this issue by examining the impact of air pollution on infant health in New Jersey over the 1990s. Policy makers and the public are highly motivated to protect these most vulnerable members of society.
There is increasing evidence of long-term effects of poor infant health on future outcomes; for example, low birth weight has been linked to future health problems and lower educational attainment (see Currie (2008) for a summary of this research).
Studying infants also overcomes several empirical challenges because, unlike adult diseases that may reflect pollution exposure that occurred many years ago, the link between cause and effect is more immediate.