Six percent of children in the United States enter foster care by age 18. We estimate the effects of foster care on children's outcomes by exploiting the quasi-random assignment of child welfare investigators in Michigan. We find that foster care improved children's safety and educational outcomes. Gains emerged after children exited the foster system when most were reunified with their birth parents, suggesting that improvements made by their parents were an important mechanism. These results indicate that safely reducing the use of foster care, a goal of recent federal legislation, requires more effective in-home, prevention-focused efforts. (JEL H75, I21, J13, K42)

中文翻译：

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暂时停留和持续收益：寄养的因果关系

美国有 6% 的儿童在 18 岁时进入寄养机构。我们通过利用密歇根州儿童福利调查员的准随机分配来估计寄养机构对儿童结局的影响。我们发现寄养改善了儿童的安全和教育成果。当大多数孩子与亲生父母团聚时，孩子们退出寄养系统后出现了收益，这表明他们的父母做出的改进是一个重要的机制。这些结果表明，安全地减少寄养的使用是最近联邦立法的一个目标，需要更有效的家庭预防工作。(JEL H75、I21、J13、K42)