Income inequality and population health: Correlation and causality

Babones, Salvatore

doi:10.1016/j.socscimed.2007.12.012

Cited by 218 publications

(157 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…For income inequality, poverty, and health, the stability of both variables becomes a complicating factor for in any fixed effects model (Babones 2008). Still, the inclusion of regime type in our final models captured the country-fixed effects to some extent.…”

Section: Modelling Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality

Fritzell

Rehnberg

Hertzman

et al. 2014

Int J Public Health

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Objectives: We aimed to examine the cross-national and cross-temporal association between poverty and mortality, in particular differentiating the impact of absolute and relative poverty.Methods: We employed pooled cross-sectional time series analysis. Our measure of relative poverty was based upon the standard 60 percent of median income. The measure of absolute, or fixed, poverty we based upon the US poverty threshold. Our analyses were conducted on data for 30 countries between 1978 and 2010, a total of 149 data points. We separately studied infant, child and adult mortality.Results: Our findings highlight the importance of relative poverty for mortality. Especially for infant and child mortality we found that our estimates of fixed poverty is close to zero either in the crude models, or when adjusting for GDP. Conversely, the relative poverty estimates increased when adjusting for confounders. Our results seemed robust to a number of sensitivity tests.Conclusions: If we agree that risk of death is important, the public policy implication of our findings is that relative poverty, which has close associations to overall inequality, should be a major concern also among rich countries.3

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Section: Modelling Strategymentioning

confidence: 99%

Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality

Fritzell

Rehnberg

Hertzman

et al. 2014

Int J Public Health

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“…After infancy, as age increased the strength of these associations decreased in both males and females, reaching a nadir amongst 15-19 year olds and then increasing in 20-24 year olds. Trends of the strength of this association were similar for males and females up to mid adolescence (10)(11)(12)(13)(14), but then diverged, with males 15-24 benefiting much less than females from an increase in GDP. Coefficients for associations of mortality and GDP varied significantly by age for all-cause (p < 0.01 in both sexes), NCD (p < 0.01 in both sexes) and injury mortality ((p < 0.01 in both sexes) but not for communicable disease mortality.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 93%

“…This association has been demonstrated in both high income and developing countries [9][10][11][12][13] and in the latter, income inequality has also been implicated in increasing malnutrition and stunting prevalence in children under 5 [13,14]. Although it has been suggested this observation reflects a "statistical artefact" due to the concave association between income and health [15], this has been challenged [16], and there is increasing evidence that the relationship is causal [1].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Impact of Income Inequality and National Wealth on Child and Adolescent Mortality in Low and Middle-Income Countries

Viner

2017

Journal of Adolescent Health

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Background: Income inequality and national wealth are strong determinants for health, but few studies have systematically investigated their influence on mortality across the early life-course, particularly outside the high-income world. Methods: We performed cross-sectional regression analyses of the relationship between income inequality (national Gini coefficient) and national wealth (Gross Domestic Product (GDP) averaged over previous decade), and all-cause and grouped cause national mortality rate amongst infants, 1-4, 5-9, 10-14, 15-19 and 20-24 year olds in low and middle-income countries (LMIC) in 2012. Gini models were adjusted for GDP. Results: Data were available for 103 (79%) countries. Gini was positively associated with increased all-cause and communicable disease mortality in both sexes across all age groups, after adjusting for national wealth. Gini was only positively associated with increased injury mortality amongst infants and 20-24 year olds, and increased noncommunicable disease mortality amongst 20-24 year old females. The strength of these associations tended to increase during adolescence. Increasing GDP was negatively associated with all-cause, communicable and non-communicable disease mortality in males and females across all age groups. GDP was also associated with decreased injury mortality in all age groups except 15-19 year old females, and 15-24 year old males. GDP became a weaker predictor of mortality during adolescence. Conclusion: Policies to reduce income inequality, rather than prioritising economic growth at all costs, may be needed to improve adolescent mortality in low and middle-income countries, a key development priority.

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“…Mansyur et al (2008) echo this in their study, saying their inconsistent findings "may be an indication that there are country-specific characteristics related to both income inequality and social capital that could also be associated with health outcomes," and they list cultural factors as one of such characteristics. Likewise, a review on the topic mentions culture as one of many factors that could be confounding the income inequality-health relationship (Babones, 2008), and Wilkinson refers to "cultural processes by which less egalitarian societies develop more aggressive and less supportive social environments" (1999b) and a "culture of inequality" in his writing (2000), though this view assumes mediation.…”

Section: Missed Opportunities For Cultural Analysis On Income Ineqmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individualism as Habitus: Reframing the Relationship between Income Inequality and Health

Adjaye-Gbewonyo

2017

hcs

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Public health literature has demonstrated a negative effect of income inequality on a number of health outcomes. Researchers have attempted to explain this phenomenon, drawing on psychosocial and neomaterialist explanations. This paper argues, however, that these approaches fail to recognize the crucial role of culture, focusing specifically on the cultural value of individualism. Through a review of the literature and Pierre Bourdieu's theory of practice as a theoretical framework, I provide support for the proposition that an ideology based in individualism is the context within which income inequality, social fragmentation, material deprivation, and consequently poor health outcomes are produced. I further offer recommendations for continued research into the role of cultural determinants in the income inequality-health relationship.

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Income inequality and population health: Correlation and causality

Cited by 218 publications

References 24 publications

Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality

Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality

The Impact of Income Inequality and National Wealth on Child and Adolescent Mortality in Low and Middle-Income Countries

Individualism as Habitus: Reframing the Relationship between Income Inequality and Health

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