 Income, Income Inequality and Health: What can we Learn from Aggregate Data?Hugh Gravelle, John Wildman and Matthew Sutton Discussion Papers from Department of Economics, University of York Abstract: It has been suggested that, especially in countries with high per capita income, there is an independent effect of income distribution on the health of individuals. One source of evidence in support of this relative income hypothesis are analyses of aggregate cross section data on population health, per capita income and income inequality. We examine the empirical robustness of cross-section analyses by using a new data set to replicate and extend the approach in a frequently cited paper. We find that the estimated relationship between income inequality and life expectancy is dependent on the data set used, the functional form estimated and the way in which the epidemiological transition is specifed. The association is never significant in any of our models. We argue there are serious methodological difficulties in using aggregate cross sections as means of testing hypotheses about the effect of income, and its distribution, on the health of individuals. New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hea Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:yor:yorken:00/26 Access Statistics for this paper More papers in Discussion Papers from Department of Economics, University of York Department of Economics and Related Studies, University of York, York, YO10 5DD, United Kingdom. Contact information at EDIRC. |
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