Deaths rise in good economic times: Evidence from the OECD

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. The Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in Bonn is a local and virtual international research center and a place of communication between science, politics and business. IZA is an independent, nonprofit limited liability company (Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung) supported by the Deutsche Post AG. The center is associated with the University of Bonn and offers a stimulating research environment through its research networks, research support, and visitors and doctoral programs. IZA engages in (i) original and internationally competitive research in all fields of labor economics, (ii) development of policy concepts, and (iii) dissemination of research results and concepts to the interested public. The current research program deals with (1) mobility and flexibility of labor, (2) internationalization of labor markets, (3) welfare state and labor market, (4) labor markets in transition countries, (5) the future of labor, (6) evaluation of labor market policies and projects and (7) general labor economics. Terms of use: Documents in D I S C U S S I O N P A P E R S E R I E SIZA Discussion Papers often represent preliminary work and are circulated to encourage discussion. Citation of such a paper should account for its provisional character. A revised version may be available on the IZA website (www.iza.org) or directly from the author. period to examine the relationship between macroeconomic conditions and fatalities. The main finding is that total mortality and deaths from several common causes increase when labor markets strengthen. For instance, controlling for year effects, location fixed effects, country-specific time trends and demographic characteristics, a one percentage point decrease in the national unemployment rate is associated with a 0.4 percent rise in total mortality and 0.4, 1.1, 1.8, 2.1 and 0.8 percent increases in deaths from cardiovascular disease, influenza/pneumonia, liver disease, motor vehicle fatalities and other accidents. These results are consistent with the findings of other recent research and cast doubt on the hypothesis that economic downturns have negative effects on physical health.JEL Classification: E32, J2, I12

Housing Instability and Alcohol Problems during the 2007–2009 US Recession: the Moderating Role of Perceived Family Support

“…Although some econometric (population-level) studies have found economic downturns to be Ryan D. Murphy, Sarah E. Zemore, and Nina Mulia related to reductions in volume of alcohol consumption, frequency of consumption, and liver-related mortality, others have found mixed results for heavy drinking and alcohol dependence. [4][5][6][7][8][9] Furthermore, individual-level studies that focus on people who are living on the street, living in areas not meant for human habitation, or accessing emergency or transitional housing services have consistently found elevated rates of alcohol use and problems among the homeless. [10][11][12][13][14][15] While important, homelessness is the most extreme form of a much larger continuum of housing instability.…”

Child mortality, commodity price volatility and the resource curse

“…To assess the relationship between economic conditions and the child mortality rate, the literature (see, inter alia, Pritchett and Summers, 1996;Ruhm, 2000;Gerdtham and Ruhm, 2006;and Gonzalez and Quast, 2011) has estimated the following equation:…”

“…Other panel studies that have considered this requirement include Ruhm (2000) and Gonzalez and Quast (2011) using data from states from within one country or Gerdtham and Ruhm (2006), examining data from OECD countries that might be considered integrated. Our data appears to satisfy the condition as CTOT fluctuations suggest enough independent variation across countries in our sample (e.g., the estimated correlation coefficients between our measures of CTOT were generally low -see section 4.2).…”

Hard times or good times? Inequalities in the health effects of economic change

“…However, whilst the media coverage tends to speculate on the negative health effects of recession, there appears to be an emerging consensus in the academic literature that the relationship between macroeconomic fluctuations and health is generally pro-cyclical. In other words, that, for example, mortality increases when the economy is growing and reduces during periods of economic recession (Ruhm 2000;Laporte 2004;Neumayer 2004;Tapia Granados 2005;Gerdtham and Ruhm 2006;Tapia Granados and Ionides 2008): that economic recessions are good for health. Many mechanisms have been put forward to explain this, including an increase in work demands and working hours during periods of growth, more traffic accidents, a higher consumption of alcohol (Ruhm and Black 2002) and tobacco (Ruhm 2000),as well as reductions in physical activity levels (Ruhm 2000), leisure time and social interactions.…”

“…These ecological associations are most often measured at a broad geographical scale, e.g. at the national (Tapia Granados 2005;Gerdtham and Ruhm 2006) or state/regional levels (Ruhm 2000) levels, although some have examined the impact of local labour market fluctuations on health at the metropolitan area level (Charles and DeCicca 2008). Observing that, at the ecological level, increasing employment rates is associated with increasing mortality cannot be inferred to operate in similar fashion at the individual level.…”