Social Capital is the various networks a person can form throughout his life time, with his relatives, friends, co-workers etc, which could become economically valuable. This could be someone from your network offering you a job or a loan or just an edge in a job interview, higher the number of people in your network, higher is the chance of you getting help from one of them. Now, researchers from the University of Iowa and University of British Columbia have looked at the effects of social capital on child nutrition in India. It is found to help low income families in gaining resources, while it also benefits high income families in procuring better health care for their children. Often, however, the poor lack access to sufficient social capital, affecting their ability to obtain good health care for their children, leading to child malnutrition. The study gives us a framework to design better policies to address the issue of child undernutrition and to provide better social and economic stability for low income families.
Read time: 1 min4 Jul 2017