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Abstract

This dissertation is comprised of three chapters that study topics on conflict and health economics with micro- and macroeconomic perspectives. The first chapter theoretically and empirically examines how exposure to protracted conflict affects farming decision and welfare of a farmer in Burundi. I establish a model in which a risk-averse farmer allocates labor inputs into activities with different levels of risk and derive decisions under the risk of violence and the constraints of the farmer. I then provide empirical evidence by combining a nationwide household survey on agricultural activities with geo-referenced conflict data. The second chapter investigates how health intervention for achieving Universal Health Coverage affects economic outcomes of ten low- and middle-income countries for the period 2019-2023. We develop a human capital augmented growth model for macroeconomic simulations, and identify two channels, the cost effects on physical capital accumulation, and demographic and health impacts on effective labour supply. The third chapter examines the impacts of adverse shocks to fetal development on fetal loss and human capital formation. I exploit variations in a prenatal health shock using the Rwanda genocide in 1994 as a natural experiment. I attempt to disentangle true effects of scarring in genes from effects due to selective mortality at birth using decomposition methods.

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