Biography: Amy Finkelstein is the John & Jennie S. MacDonald Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is the co-founder and co-Scientific Director of J-PAL North America, a research center at MIT that encourages and facilitates randomized evaluations of important domestic policy issues. She is also the co-Director of the Economics of Health Program at the National Bureau of Economic Research and was the founding Editor of American Economic Review: Insights.

Trading Goods for Lives: The Effect of NAFTA on Mortality

with Matthew Notowidigdo and Steven Shi

Abstract:  We leverage spatial variation in exposure to the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) to examine its impact on mortality and explore quantitative implications for the welfare effects of NAFTA. Areas more exposed to Mexican import competition by NAFTA experienced larger increases in mortality. In the 14 years post-NAFTA, an area with average NAFTA exposure experienced an increase in annual, age adjusted mortality of 0.68 percent (standard error = 0.19). NAFTA-induced mortality increases are particularly pronounced among working-age men, a demographic that also experienced disproportionate NAFTA-induced employment declines. Comparisons with the mortality effects of other economic contractions suggest that, unlike declines in the non-manufacturing employment-to-population (EPOP) ratio which reduce mortality, declines in manufacturing EPOP consistently increase mortality.