Decomposing socioeconomic inequalities in childhood obesity: Evidence from Ireland

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. Abstract: Carbon taxes increase the cost of necessary household energy expenditures. In many developed countries, carbon taxes are regressive as they comprise a greater proportion of a poorer household's income. Certain socioeconomic groups are more negatively affected by these impacts than others. While inequality of incidence by income group has received great attention in the literature, a gap exists to quantify the inequality associated with socioeconomic characteristics. This information is policy-relevant as it may inform the most effective means to offset negative welfare impacts through changes to taxes and/or social transfers. This paper provides this contribution. First, the inequality of carbon tax incidence across the income spectrum is quantified using the concentration index methodology. A subsequent multivariate decomposition quantifies the contribution each socioeconomic factor makes towards this inequality of incidence. This is carried out for electricity, motor fuel and all other home fuels to elicit variation of socioeconomic incidence by source. While income contributes a great deal towards inequality of incidence for other home fuels, socioeconomic characteristics are the primary determinants of electricity and motor fuel-related carbon tax incidence. The relative importance of each characteristic in determining regressive impacts is quantified and this varies by carbon tax source. *Corresponding Author: niall.farrell@esri.ie

Childhood obesity and maternal education in Ireland

“…Walsh and Cullinan (2015) also found a significant socioeconomic gradient of obesity using the same dataset. In their case the measure of SES was equivalised disposable income and the gradient was explored using concentration indices.…”

What Factors Drive Inequalities in Carbon Tax Incidence? Decomposing Socioeconomic Inequalities in Carbon Tax Incidence in Ireland

“…The concentration index is a metric of inequality commonly employed to analyse the socioeconomic gradient of health outcomes, with multivariate decomposition of this metric widely applied in the field of health economics. Applications to date have analysed socioeconomic inequalities in obesity [41], vaccine uptake [10], malnutrition [39], doctor utilisation [37] and disease [46]. This paper augments the field of application to analyse socioeconomic inequalities in carbon tax incidence.…”

“…Combining these methods to identify the impact socioeconomic variables have in determining overall inequality across the income spectrum has been overlooked. This paper addresses this gap, decomposing inequalities associated with carbon tax incidence using the concentration index, a method commonly employed to decompose socioeconomic inequalities in health outcomes [41,37,46,39].…”

Socioeconomic Inequality in Overweight/Obesity and Related Factors in Adolescents in Kermanshah-Iran

“…), and nutritional status data (diet and meals, fast food consumption, and physical activity). The questions in socioeconomic and nutritional status were based on previous studies (conducted in this field) as well as those used in the population and housing census designed by the Statistical Center of Iran (3,10,(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19). All the questionnaires were self-administered and were given to eligible students (those who were student in one of the high schools in Kermanshah city with the lack of specific diseases) along with an informed consent to participate in the study.…”