Unfit for work: Health and labour-market prospects

Abstract

Aim: The aim of this study was to examine whether health status (number of chronic diseases, health shock and use of tranquilizers/sleeping pills) is related to labour-market outcomes later in life. Methods: Twin data for Finnish men and women who were at least 33 years old in 1990 were linked to comprehensive register-based information on unemployment and the incidence of disability pension. We used the within-twin dimension of the data to account for shared family and genetic factors. Self-reported information on the number of diagnosed chronic diseases, health shock and drug use were obtained from the 1975 and 1981 twin surveys, when the twins were at least 18 years old. unemployment months and the incidence of disability pension were measured during prime working age over the 1990-2004/2009 period. Results: Poor health status is significantly positively related to unemployment and the incidence of disability pension. The results are robust to controlling for shared family and genetic factors and the key measures of risky health behaviours (alcohol use, lifetime smoking and body mass index). Conclusions: Health status is a fundamental determinant of long-term labour-market outcomes.

Sustainable Working Life in a Swedish Twin Cohort—A Definition Paper with Sample Overview

“…The possibility to take into account genetic contributions to variation in “sustainable working life” is also important in order to show possible causality between various factors of interest and sustainable work-life participation. To the best of our knowledge, such studies have primarily focused on the associations between risk factors and interruptions, e.g., SA/DP or unemployment [ 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ]. However, these earlier studies in which researchers of this article have been involved have shown that the heritability varies based on diagnosis groups for DP [ 16 , 17 , 18 ].…”

Pieces in a big puzzle: On the relationship between health and employment

“…Unger, Tisch and Tophoven [18] analyse the relationship between health and labor market status in their article Age and gender differences in the impact of labour market transitions on subjective health in Germany. In contrast to the health selection thesis studied by Böckerman and Maczuskij [17], they, however, focus on the social causation thesis, suggesting an impact of job loss and re-employment on self-assessed health. The results based on propensity score matching highlight heterogeneity in the health effects of labor market transitions.…”

“…An important recent article suggests that health, as well as many social and economic outcomes in adulthood, is to a large extent determined in early childhood [16]. The article Unfit for work: Health and labor market prospects by Böckerman and Maczuskij [17] published in this issue extends the literature on the relationship between accumulating health capital and labor market outcomes by investigating the relationship between chronic diseases in early adulthood and labor market outcomes in prime working age. Results based on the classical twin design strengthen the previous findings suggesting that accumulating health capital in childhood, adolescence and early adulthood shapes individuals’ long-term labor market outcomes.…”

Consumption of psychotropic drugs among disability pension applicants with mental disorders: comparing awarded and rejected applicants in Finland

“…Consumption of psychotropic drugs can be considered a proxy measure of mental health status and has been shown to predict future disability pension over and above sociodemographic factors [7][8][9]. Studies on the trajectories of purchased psychotropic drugs before and after disability retirement in Finland have shown a similar inversed U-shaped curve as described above: there is a notable increase in the amount of purchased drugs during the months preceding the award and a steady decrease thereafter [10][11][12].…”