Macroeconomic conditions and health: Inspecting the transmission mechanism

Emilio Colombo, Valentina Rotondi and Luca Stanca

Economics & Human Biology, 2018, vol. 28, issue C, 29-37

Abstract: We study the relationship between macroeconomic conditions and self-reported health in a large sample of Italian individuals, focusing on the mediating role played by health behaviors (smoking, alcohol consumption, physical activity, eating habits) and economic stress. Our findings indicate that, overall, higher local unemployment is negatively related to individuals’ health conditions. A one percentage point increase in the province-level unemployment rate is associated with a significant increase in the probability of experiencing diabetes (0.03 percentage points), infarction (0.01), ulcer (0.06), cirrhosis (0.01) and nervous disorders (0.07), with a time lag that differs across individual health conditions. Employment status and educational level play a significant role as moderators of these relationships. Eating habits, in addition to economic stress, play a key role as mediators, by enhancing the negative relationship between macroeconomic conditions and health outcomes, while physical exercise is found to play a dampening role.

Keywords: Economic conditions; Unemployment; Health behaviors; Health outcomes (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I1 I10 I12 I18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1570677X17300953
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
Working Paper: Macroeconomic Conditions and Health: Inspecting the Transmission Mechanism (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ehbiol:v:28:y:2018:i:c:p:29-37

DOI: 10.1016/j.ehb.2017.11.005

Access Statistics for this article

Economics & Human Biology is currently edited by J. Komlos, Inas R Kelly and Joerg Baten

More articles in Economics & Human Biology from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().