Causes of Inequality in Health : Who Are You? Where You Live? Or Who Your Parents Were?

Wagstaff, Adam ; Paci, Pierella ; Joshi, Heather

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ADULTHOOD;    ALCOHOL;    CHILD DEVELOPMENT;    CHILDHOOD;    CLIMATE;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-2713
RP-ID  :  WPS2713

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Data from the British National ChildDevelopment Study show that, among 33-year-olds, ill health(as measured by cardinalized responses to a question onself-assessed health) is concentrated among the worse off.The authors seek to decompose the inequalities in healthstatus into their socioeconomic causes. In thisdecomposition, inequalities in health status depend oninequalities in each of the underlying determinants ofhealth and on the elasticities of health status with respectto each of these determinants. The authors estimate theseelasticities using regression models that allow forunobserved heterogeneity at the community level. They findthat inequalities in unobserved community-level influencesaccount for only 6 percent of health inequality, andinequalities in parental education and social class for only4 percent. Inequalities in income and housing tenure accountfor most health inequality, though inequalities ineducational attainment and in math scores at age seven alsoplay a part.