How Children’s Education Affects The Health Of Middle-aged And Elderly Parents In The Context Of Aging

As an important part of human capital,health has always been a key issue of economists’ research.Especially in the field of labor economics,the increase of individual health can not only increase labor productivity,but also promote the improvement of personal utility.In the context of the current accelerated social aging trend in China,the burden of social pensions has increased.How to protect the elderly has become the focus of attention of the whole society.Chinese people have always had the idea of ‘raising children to prevent old age,accumulating grain to prevent hunger’.Children bear the main responsibility of supporting their parents.Parents’ health in old-age is closely related to their children’s personal ability and social resources.Education is an important way for children to accumulate human capital and ability.The improvement of children’s education level is not only conducive to their own development,but also greatly beneficial to the support and care of parents.Based on the 2018 China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study,this paper comprehensively used research methods such as OLS regression,propensity value matching,mediation effect analysis,and Generalized Ordered Logit model,this article focused on children’s education whether can promote the health of elderly parents or not,systematically analyzed the impact of children’s education level on the health of elderly parents and its mechanism.This article found that children’s education level has a significant role in promoting parents’ subjective health assessment and physical health,which is still valid after considering the endogenous problem.In addition to directly affecting the health of the parents,the improvement of children’s education will also indirectly affect the health of parents in three ways,including improving mental health of the parents,giving them more financial support and promoting parents to develop healthy living habits.Among the various channels,children’s economic capacity has the largest impact,followed by improving the mental health of parents,and finally promoting parents to develop healthier lifestyle.The indirect effects of the three mechanisms accounted for24.7% of parents’ self-evaluation health,the remaining 75.3% was the direct effect.The indirect effects of the three mechanisms accounted for 46.8% of education’s effect on parents’ physical function,and the remaining 53.2% is the direct effect.Moreover,in rural areas and the central and western regions,children’s education has a greater effect on the health of parents than in urban and eastern regions.In these places where public resources are relatively few,children’s education has played a greater role in the health of parents,which indicates that in the case of limited resources,children’s education is an important way for parents to obtain economic and social resources,and it has played a greater role in parents’ acquisition of health knowledge,cultivating good living habits,and promoting physical and mental health.Based on the above results,this article believes that vigorously developing education,broadening higher education entrance channels,and consolidating the educational foundation in backward areas can not only improve the cultural literacy of residents,but also have a spillover effect on the health of parents,which can improve residents’ health and human capital and ease A powerful move to provide for the pressure of the elderly.