IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ctl/louvir/2020020.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Rather Limited Role Of Mental Ill Health In Driving Work Beyond 50

Author

Listed:
  • Vincent Vandenberghe

    (UNIVERSITE CATHOLIQUE DE LOUVAIN, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES))

Abstract

This paper's aim is to contribute to the literature on elderly employment barriers by exploring the role of mental health relative to that of physical health, and the complementarity between the two. The paper uses European SHARE data. It considers the distinction between the extensive and the intensive margin of work (employment rate and hours) as well as wages/productivity. Results point at the limited role of mental health in determining employment (extensive margin) and hours (the extensive margin) in comparison to physical health. Also, men's employment or hours respond more to health problems, singularly mental ones. Another result is that ill health (be it physical or mental) has no impact on wages. Finally, results suggest moderate complementarity between mental health and physical ill health in degrading people's capacity to stay in paid employment.

Suggested Citation

  • Vincent Vandenberghe, 2020. "The Rather Limited Role Of Mental Ill Health In Driving Work Beyond 50," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2020020, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    • Handle: RePEc:ctl:louvir:2020020
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://sites.uclouvain.be/econ/DP/IRES/2020020.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Benoit Dostie, 2011. "Wages, Productivity and Aging," De Economist, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 139-158, June.
    2. Eve Caroli & Andrea Bassanini, 2015. "Is Work bad for Health ? The Role of Constraint Versus Choice," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 119-120, pages 13-37.
    3. Sveinbjörn Blöndal & Stefano Scarpetta, 1999. "The Retirement Decision in OECD Countries," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 202, OECD Publishing.
    4. Richard Blundell & Jack Britton & Monica Costa Dias & Eric French, 2023. "The Impact of Health on Labor Supply near Retirement," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 58(1), pages 282-334.
    5. Alain Jousten & Mathieu Lefèbvre & Sergio Perelman & Pierre Pestieau, 2010. "The Effects of Early Retirement on Youth Unemployment: The Case of Belgium," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Relationship to Youth Employment, pages 47-76, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. David A. Wise, 2017. "Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number wise-22, March.
    7. Susan L. Ettner & Richard G. Frank & Ronald C. Kessler, 1997. "The Impact of Psychiatric Disorders on Labor Market Outcomes," NBER Working Papers 5989, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Boris HirschBy & Daniel S. J. Lechmann & Claus Schnabel, 2017. "Coming to work while sick: an economic theory of presenteeism with an application to German data," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(4), pages 1010-1031.
    9. Courtney Coile & Kevin Milligan & David A. Wise, 2017. "Introduction to "Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages"," NBER Chapters, in: Social Security Programs and Retirement around the World: The Capacity to Work at Older Ages, pages 1-33, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. V. Vandenberghe & F. Waltenberg & M. Rigo, 2013. "Ageing and employability. Evidence from Belgian firm-level data," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 111-136, August.
    11. David Dorn & Alfonso Sousa-Poza, 2010. "'Voluntary' and 'involuntary' early retirement: an international analysis," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(4), pages 427-438.
    12. Lazear, Edward P, 1979. "Why Is There Mandatory Retirement?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 87(6), pages 1261-1284, December.
    13. Francoise Delmez & Vincent Vandenberghe, 2018. "Long Working Hours Make Us Less Productive but Also Less Costly," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 32(4), pages 259-287, December.
    14. Hutchens, Robert, 1986. "Delayed Payment Contracts and a Firm's Propensity to Hire Older Workers," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 4(4), pages 439-457, October.
    15. Moran, John R. & Short, Pamela Farley & Hollenbeak, Christopher S., 2011. "Long-term employment effects of surviving cancer," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 505-514, May.
    16. Knapp, Martin & Wong, Gloria, 2020. "Economics and mental health: the current scenario," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 102717, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. Vegard Skirbekk, 2004. "Age and Individual Productivity: A Literature Survey," Vienna Yearbook of Population Research, Vienna Institute of Demography (VID) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna, vol. 2(1), pages 133-154.
    18. Eve Caroli & Andrea Bassanini, 2015. "Is Work bad for Health ? The Role of Constraint Versus Choice," Annals of Economics and Statistics, GENES, issue 119-120, pages 13-37.
    19. Grossman, Michael, 1972. "On the Concept of Health Capital and the Demand for Health," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 80(2), pages 223-255, March-Apr.
    20. Laura Abramovsky & Britta Augsburg & Pamela Jervis & Bansi Malde & Angus Phimister, 2019. "Complementarities in the Production of Child Health," IFS Working Papers W19/15, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    21. Dwyer, Debra Sabatini & Mitchell, Olivia S., 1999. "Health problems as determinants of retirement: Are self-rated measures endogenous?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 173-193, April.
    22. Richard Layard, 2013. "Mental health: the new frontier for labour economics," IZA Journal of Labor Policy, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 2(1), pages 1-16, December.
    23. John Bound, 1991. "Self-Reported Versus Objective Measures of Health in Retirement Models," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 26(1), pages 106-138.
    24. Frijters, Paul & Johnston, David W. & Shields, Michael A., 2010. "Mental Health and Labour Market Participation: Evidence from IV Panel Data Models," IZA Discussion Papers 4883, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Vincent Vandenberghe, 2021. "Work beyond the age of 50. What role for mental versus physical health?," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 35(3), pages 311-347, September.
    2. Vincent VANDENBERGHE, 2021. "Health, cognition and work capacity beyond the age of 50: International evidence on the extensive and intensive margins of work," International Labour Review, International Labour Organization, vol. 160(2), pages 271-310, June.
    3. Vandenberghe, Vincent, 2019. "Health, Cognition and Work Capacity Beyond the Age of 50," GLO Discussion Paper Series 295, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    4. Даниелян, Владимир, 2016. "Детерминанты Пенсионного Возраста: Обзор Исследований [Determinants of Retirement Age: A Review of Research]," MPRA Paper 73865, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Vandenberghe, Vincent, 2021. "Work Beyond the Age of 50. What Role for Mental v.s. Physical Health?," GLO Discussion Paper Series 796, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    6. Vandenberghe, V., 2013. "Are firms willing to employ a greying and feminizing workforce?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(C), pages 30-46.
    7. V. Vandenberghe, 2011. "Boosting the Employment Rate of Older Men and Women," De Economist, Springer, vol. 159(2), pages 159-191, June.
    8. Sime Smolic & Ivan Cipin & Petra Medimurec, 2020. "How is health associated with employment during later working life in Croatia?," Public Sector Economics, Institute of Public Finance, vol. 44(1), pages 99-116.
    9. V. Vandenberghe & F. Waltenberg & M. Rigo, 2013. "Ageing and employability. Evidence from Belgian firm-level data," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 111-136, August.
    10. Pierre-Jean Messe & François-Charles Wolff, 2019. "Healthier when retiring earlier? Evidence from France," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 51(47), pages 5122-5143, October.
    11. Jiayi Wen & Zixi Ye & Xuan Zhang, 2024. "A New Testing Method for Justification Bias Using High-Frequency Data of Health and Employment," Papers 2403.06368, arXiv.org.
    12. Maarten Lindeboom & Marcel Kerkhofs, 2004. "Subjective Health Measures, Reporting Errors and Endogeneity in the Relationship Between Health and Work," CEIS Research Paper 46, Tor Vergata University, CEIS.
    13. Bryan, M.; & Roberts, J.; & Sechel, C.;, 2019. "The Effect of Mental Health on Employment:Accounting for Selection Bias," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 19/14, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    14. Dhaval Dave & Inas Rashad & Jasmina Spasojevic, 2006. "The Effects of Retirement on Physical and Mental Health Outcomes," NBER Working Papers 12123, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Deschryvere, Matthias, 2004. "Health and Retirement. An Update of the Literature," Discussion Papers 932, The Research Institute of the Finnish Economy.
    16. Dhaval Dave & Inas Rashad & Jasmina Spasojevic, 2008. "The Effects of Retirement on Physical and Mental Health Outcomes," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 75(2), pages 497-523, August.
    17. Schneider, Lutz, 2011. "Zum Einfluss von Alter und Erfahrung auf Produktivitäts- und Lohnprofile - Befunde einer Linked-Employer-Employee-Analyse," VfS Annual Conference 2011 (Frankfurt, Main): The Order of the World Economy - Lessons from the Crisis 48728, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Vigtel, Trond Christian, 2018. "The retirement age and the hiring of senior workers," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 247-270.
    19. Courtney C. Coile, 2015. "Economic Determinants Of Workers’ Retirement Decisions," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(4), pages 830-853, September.
    20. Eric French & John Bailey Jones, 2017. "Health, Health Insurance, and Retirement: A Survey," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 9(1), pages 383-409, September.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Ageing; Mental Health; Physical Health; Work; Work Capacity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J22 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Time Allocation and Labor Supply
    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • J26 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Retirement; Retirement Policies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ctl:louvir:2020020. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Virginie LEBLANC (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iruclbe.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.