Income and race differences in children's health in the mid-1960s

This article explores income and race differences in eight measures of the health of children ages 6 through 11 as assessed in the early 1960s. It is shown that both income and race differences in health are much less pronounced than they are in infant mortality and birth weight data. Significant differences are found in the health status of black and white children and of children from high- and low-income families, but these are primarily differences with respect to parent-reported (rather than physician-reported) health criteria and they by no means overwhelmingly favor the white or high-income children. These findings underscore the importance of treating children's health status as multidimensional. In addition, these findings will serve as a bench mark for studies of children's health using data for a more recent period.