The Impact of Income on the Weight of Elderly Americans

John Cawley (), John R. Moran and Kosali Ilayperuma Simon ()

No 14104, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper tests whether income affects the body weight and clinical weight classification of elderly Americans using a natural experiment that led otherwise identical retirees to receive significantly different Social Security payments based on their year of birth. We exploit this natural experiment by estimating models of instrumental variables using data from the National Health Interview Surveys. The model estimates rule out even moderate effects of income on weight and on the probability of being underweight or obese, especially for men.

JEL-codes: H55 I1 I12 I38 J14 J26 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-age and nep-hea
Date: 2008-06
Note: AG HC HE LS PE

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