Accounting for the dead in the longitudinal analysis of income-related health inequalities

Publication type

Journal Article

Authors

Publication date

June 1, 2011

Summary:

This paper develops an accounting framework to consider the effect of deaths on the longitudinal analysis of income-related health inequalities. Ignoring deaths or using Inverse Probability Weights (IPWs) to re-weight the sample for mortality-related attrition can produce misleading results. Incorporating deaths into the longitudinal analysis of income-related health inequalities provides a more complete picture in terms of the evaluation of health changes in respect to socioeconomic status. We illustrate our work by investigating health mobility from 1999 till 2004 using the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). We show that for Scottish males explicitly accounting for the dead rather than using IPWs to account for mortality-related attrition changes the direction of the relationship between relative health changes and initial income position, from negative to positive, while for other groups it significantly increases the strength of the positive relationship. Incorporating the dead may be vital in the longitudinal analysis of health inequalities.

Published in

Journal of Health Economics

Volume and page numbers

Volume: 30 , p.1 -1

DOI

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jhealeco.2011.07.004

ISSN

1676296

Subjects

Notes

Albert Sloman Library Periodicals *restricted to Univ. Essex registered users*


Related Publications

#520075

News

Latest findings, new research

Publications search

Search all research by subject and author

Podcasts

Researchers discuss their findings and what they mean for society

Projects

Background and context, methods and data, aims and outputs

Events

Conferences, seminars and workshops

Survey methodology

Specialist research, practice and study

Taking the long view

ISER's annual report

Themes

Key research themes and areas of interest