 The Dow is Killing Me: Risky Health Behaviors and the Stock MarketChad Cotti, Richard Dunn and Nathan Tefft No 159976, Working Paper series from University of Connecticut, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy Abstract: We investigate how risky health behaviors and self - reported health vary with the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) and during stock market crashes. Because stock market indices are leading indicators of economic performance, this research contributes to our understanding of the macroeconomic determinants of health. Existing studies typically rely on the unemployment rate to proxy for economic performance, but this measure captures only one of many channels through which the economic environment may influence individual health decisions. We find that large, negative monthly DJIA returns, decreases in the level of the DJIA, and stock market crashes are widely associated with worsening self-reported mental health and more cigarette smoking, binge drinking, and fatal car accidents involving alcohol. These results are consistent with predictions from rational addiction models and have implications for research on the association between consumption and stock prices. Keywords: Risk; and; Uncertainty (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:ucozwp:159976 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Working Paper series from University of Connecticut, Charles J. Zwick Center for Food and Resource Policy Contact information at EDIRC. |
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