TY  - JOUR
AU  - Chaikind,Stephen
AU  - Corman,Hope
TI  - The Special Education Costs of Low Birthweight
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 3461
PY  - 1990
Y2  - October 1990
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3461
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w3461.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Hope Corman
Rider University
2083 Lawrenceville Road
Lawrenceville, NJ 08648
Tel: 609/895-5559
Fax: 609/896-5387
E-Mail: corman@rider.edu
AB  - This paper investigates the relationship between low birthweight, enrollment in special education and special education costs in the united states. we use the Child Health Supplement to the 1988 National Health Interview Survey, obtaining a sample of approximately 8,000 children aged 6 to 15 who are in school. For these children, we calculate the probability of attending special education, holding constant, individual, family and regional variables. We find that children who weighed less than 2500 grams at birth are almost; fifty percent more likely to be enrolled in any type of special education than children who were of normal weight at birth. Since previous studies have found the incremental cost, of special education (1989-1990) to be $4,350 per student, this results in an incremental cost; of special education of $370.8 million (1989-1990) per year due to low birth weight, holding other characteristics constant, these costs, which were conservatively estimated, imply that previous studies, which considered only medical expenditures, substantially underestimate the full cost; of low birthweight.
ER  -