The Role of Ethnic and Rural Discrimination in the Relationship Between Income Inequality and Health in Guatemala

This article seeks to understand in the ways in which income inequality can affect children's health (z-score of stunting) in Guatemala. We postulate that there are several transmission channels through which income inequality can affect health and that the children's ethnic and rural origins influence the size and direction of this effect. The methodology employed is systems of simultaneous equations (three-stage least squares and generalized method of moments). Our results highlight the importance of rural and indigenous characteristics in the relationship between income inequality and child health and indicate that the most important transmission channels are household income levels and maternal education.