Long-term impact of a large-scale school feeding program on labor market outcomes: Evidence from India

• Applicant: Professorin Rajshri Jayaraman, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Economic Policy, Applied Economics
• Term: since 2025
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 572679505

This project examines the long-term labor market effects of India’s national school feeding program—the Midday Meal Scheme (MDM). While the short-run impacts of school feeding on child nutrition, health, and education have been extensively studied, there is limited evidence on whether these benefits persist into adulthood in the form of improved employment outcomes. This is a critical gap, particularly for low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), where such programs are widespread and labor market conditions remain precarious. India’s MDM, the world’s largest school feeding initiative, was introduced in a staggered manner across states between 2002 and 2004. This variation generates plausibly exogenous exposure for children born between 1990 and 2000, who are now of working age. Drawing on this natural experiment, I estimate the causal impact of school feeding exposure during primary school on adult labor force participation, employment quality, and earnings. The project focuses on three questions: (1) What is the overall effect of MDM exposure on adult labor outcomes? (2) What are the underlying mechanisms—such as human capital accumulation, occupational sorting, or shifts in marriage and family dynamics—that account for any observed effects? (3) Does MDM exposure reduce or widen existing socio-economic disparities by gender, caste, religion, or geography? The analysis uses nationally representative data from India’s Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS, 2017–2024) and National Family Health Survey (NFHS, 2015–16, 2019–21). These data permit a detailed investigation of labor market outcomes, educational attainment, health, and family structure. The empirical strategy applies a difference-in-differences approach using the staggered rollout of MDM, supplemented with recent methodological developments that address heterogeneous treatment effects, small-cluster inference, and potential exposure misclassification due to migration. The study contributes to three strands of research: the long-run impacts of childhood interventions, the economics of school feeding, and labor market inequalities in LMICs. It also offers timely policy insights, given the scale of school feeding programs globally and renewed interest in their cost-effectiveness. The project will be implemented with the support of a doctoral researcher and a student assistant. Findings will be disseminated through journal submissions, conferences, and publicly accessible replication code.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: India
• Cooperation Partner: Professorin Tanika Chakraborty, Ph.D.