IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v366y2025ics0277953625000115.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Economic inequality, intergenerational mobility, and life expectancy

Author

Listed:
  • Xiong, Ning
  • Wei, Yehua Dennis

Abstract

This study explores the mediating role of intergenerational mobility (IM) in the relationship between economic inequality and population health in the United States, focusing on life expectancy. Using multilevel structural equation modeling across state and commuting zone (CZ) levels for both genders, we find that economic inequality indices, except for the top 1 percent's income share, adversely affect life expectancy through absolute and relative mobility. Specifically, economic inequality reduces life expectancy more significantly through absolute mobility, especially among males and lower-income groups, with nuanced impacts observed across different geographic levels. Relative mobility also plays a role, primarily affecting males in lower-income groups at the CZ level, showing disparities between genders and no effects on higher-income groups. Including certain covariates, particularly social capital and Black population share, renders previously statistically significant absolute mobility effects for females and relative mobility effects for males at the state level insignificant. The indirect effects of economic inequality on life expectancy through absolute mobility effects for males remain consistently significant across all covariate inclusions. Our study offers nuanced insights into how economic inequality affects life expectancy through IM, suggesting targeted interventions to mitigate disparities and improve public health.

Suggested Citation

  • Xiong, Ning & Wei, Yehua Dennis, 2025. "Economic inequality, intergenerational mobility, and life expectancy," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 366(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:366:y:2025:i:c:s0277953625000115
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2025.117682
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953625000115
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socscimed.2025.117682?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paolo Acciari & Alberto Polo & Giovanni L. Violante, 2022. "And Yet It Moves: Intergenerational Mobility in Italy," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 118-163, July.
    2. Raj Chetty & Matthew O. Jackson & Theresa Kuchler & Johannes Stroebel & Nathaniel Hendren & Robert B. Fluegge & Sara Gong & Federico Gonzalez & Armelle Grondin & Matthew Jacob & Drew Johnston & Martin, 2022. "Social capital I: measurement and associations with economic mobility," Nature, Nature, vol. 608(7921), pages 108-121, August.
    3. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren & Maggie R Jones & Sonya R Porter, 2020. "Race and Economic Opportunity in the United States: an Intergenerational Perspective [“Intergenerational Mobility of Immigrants in the US Over Two Centuries,”]," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(2), pages 711-783.
    4. Wilkinson, Richard G & Pickett, Kate E., 2006. "Income inequality and population health: A review and explanation of the evidence," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 62(7), pages 1768-1784, April.
    5. Miles Corak, 2013. "Income Inequality, Equality of Opportunity, and Intergenerational Mobility," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(3), pages 79-102, Summer.
    6. Courtenay, Will H., 2000. "Constructions of masculinity and their influence on men's well-being: a theory of gender and health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 50(10), pages 1385-1401, May.
    7. Anne Case & Angus Deaton, 2017. "Mortality and Morbidity in the 21st Century," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 48(1 (Spring), pages 397-476.
    8. Xi Song & Catherine G. Massey & Karen A. Rolf & Joseph P. Ferrie & Jonathan L. Rothbaum & Yu Xie, 2020. "Long-term decline in intergenerational mobility in the United States since the 1850s," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 117(1), pages 251-258, January.
    9. Charles I. Jones, 2015. "Pareto and Piketty: The Macroeconomics of Top Income and Wealth Inequality," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 29(1), pages 29-46, Winter.
    10. repec:osf:osfxxx:yjvru_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren & Patrick Kline & Emmanuel Saez, 2014. "Where is the land of Opportunity? The Geography of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(4), pages 1553-1623.
    12. Paolo Brunori & Francisco H. G. Ferreira & Vito Peragine, 2013. "Inequality of Opportunity, Income Inequality, and Economic Mobility: Some International Comparisons," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Eva Paus (ed.), Getting Development Right, chapter 0, pages 85-115, Palgrave Macmillan.
    13. Facundo Alvaredo & Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez & Lucas Chancel & Gabriel Zucman, 2018. "World Inequality Report 2018," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) halshs-01885458, HAL.
    14. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez, 2014. "Inequality in the long run," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) halshs-01053609, HAL.
    15. Venkataramani, A.S. & Chatterjee, P. & Kawachi, I. & Tsai, A.C., 2016. "Economic opportunity, health behaviors, and mortality in the United States," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 106(3), pages 478-484.
    16. Gugushvili, Alexi & Zelinska, Olga & Präg, Patrick & Bulczak, Grzegorz, 2022. "Does perceived social mobility affect health? Evidence from a fixed effects approach," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 294(C).
    17. Florence Jaumotte & Subir Lall & Chris Papageorgiou, 2013. "Rising Income Inequality: Technology, or Trade and Financial Globalization?," IMF Economic Review, Palgrave Macmillan;International Monetary Fund, vol. 61(2), pages 271-309, June.
    18. Kawachi, Ichiro & Kennedy, Bruce P. & Gupta, Vanita & Prothrow-Stith, Deborah, 1999. "Women's status and the health of women and men: a view from the States," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 48(1), pages 21-32, January.
    19. O'Connor, Kelsey J. & Graham, Carol, 2019. "Longer, more optimistic, lives: Historic optimism and life expectancy in the United States," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 168(C), pages 374-392.
    20. Melissa S. Kearney & Phillip B. Levine, 2016. "Income Inequality, Social Mobility, and the Decision to Drop Out of High School," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 47(1 (Spring), pages 333-396.
    21. Suss, Joel & Kemeny, Thomas & Connor, Dylan Shane, 2023. "GEOWEALTH: spatial wealth inequality data for the United States, 1960-2020," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 119980, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    22. Raj Chetty & John N. Friedman & Nathaniel Hendren & Maggie R. Jones & Sonya R. Porter, 2018. "The Opportunity Atlas: Mapping the Childhood Roots of Social Mobility," Working Papers 18-42, Center for Economic Studies, U.S. Census Bureau.
    23. Pickett, Kate E. & Wilkinson, Richard G., 2015. "Income inequality and health: A causal review," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 128(C), pages 316-326.
    24. Stein, E.M. & Gennuso, K.P. & Ugboaja, D.C. & Remington, P.L., 2017. "The epidemic of despair among white americans: Trends in the leading causes of premature death, 1999-2015," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 107(10), pages 1541-1547.
    25. Ning Xiong & Yehua Dennis Wei & Sergio J Rey, 2024. "Urban sprawl and racial inequality in intergenerational mobility," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 24(2), pages 309-332.
    26. Thomas Piketty & Emmanuel Saez, 2003. "Income Inequality in the United States, 1913–1998," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 118(1), pages 1-41.
    27. Schechtl, Manuel, 2024. "Wealth Inequality and Intergenerational Income Mobility in the United States," OSF Preprints yjvru, Center for Open Science.
    28. Steven N. Durlauf & Ananth Seshadri, 2018. "Understanding the Great Gatsby Curve," NBER Macroeconomics Annual, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(1), pages 333-393.
    29. Kawachi, I. & Kennedy, B.P. & Lochner, K. & Prothrow-Stith, D., 1997. "Social capital, income inequality, and mortality," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 87(9), pages 1491-1498.
    30. Poulin, M.J. & Brown, S.L. & Dillard, A.J. & Smith, D.M., 2013. "Giving to others and the association between stress and mortality," American Journal of Public Health, American Public Health Association, vol. 103(9), pages 1649-1655.
    31. Rasmus Hoffmann & Hannes Kröger & Eduwin Pakpahan, 2018. "The reciprocal relationship between material factors and health in the life course: evidence from SHARE and ELSA," European Journal of Ageing, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 379-391, December.
    32. Kondo, Naoki & Kawachi, Ichiro & Subramanian, S.V. & Takeda, Yasuhisa & Yamagata, Zentaro, 2008. "Do social comparisons explain the association between income inequality and health?: Relative deprivation and perceived health among male and female Japanese individuals," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 67(6), pages 982-987, September.
    33. Chen, Zhuo & Gotway Crawford, Carol A., 2012. "The role of geographic scale in testing the income inequality hypothesis as an explanation of health disparities," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 75(6), pages 1022-1031.
    34. Layte, Richard & Whelan, Christopher T., 2014. "Who Feels Inferior? A Test of the Status Anxiety Hypothesis of Social Inequalities in Health," Papers WP476, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI).
    35. Dan Andrews & Andrew Leigh, 2009. "More inequality, less social mobility," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 16(15), pages 1489-1492.
    36. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01053609 is not listed on IDEAS
    37. Hoffmann, Rasmus & Kröger, Hannes & Pakpahan, Eduwin, 2018. "The reciprocal relationship between material factors and health in the life course: evidence from SHARE and ELSA," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 15(4), pages 379-391.
    38. repec:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2017.303941_0 is not listed on IDEAS
    39. Kim, Taehoon & Kim, Jinho, 2020. "Linking adolescent future expectations to health in adulthood: Evidence and mechanisms," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 263(C).
    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. Peng, Baochun, 2021. "Positional competition: A theory of the Great Gatsby curve and the Easterlin paradox," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 186(C), pages 562-575.
    2. Guido Neidhöfer, 2019. "Intergenerational mobility and the rise and fall of inequality: Lessons from Latin America," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 17(4), pages 499-520, December.
    3. Daza, Sebastian & palloni, alberto, 2018. "Income Mobility, Income Inequality and Mortality in the U.S," SocArXiv gdz2a, Center for Open Science.
    4. Michael Cauvel & Miguel Alejandro Sanchez, 2023. "Life Expectancy and the Labor Share in the U.S," Working Papers PKWP2308, Post Keynesian Economics Society (PKES).
    5. Battiston, Diego Ezequiel & Maurer, Stephan Ernst & Potlogea, Andrei & Rodríguez Mora, José V., 2023. "The dynamics of the 'Great Gatsby Curve' and a look at the curve during the Great Gatsby era," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121316, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. van der Weide, Roy & Lakner, Christoph & Mahler, Daniel Gerszon & Narayan, Ambar & Gupta, Rakesh, 2024. "Intergenerational mobility around the world: A new database," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    7. Kelsey Carlston & Yehua Dennis Wei, 2024. "Urban Sprawl and Intergenerational Mobility: City- and Neighborhood-Level Effects of Sprawl," Economic Development Quarterly, , vol. 38(4), pages 235-248, November.
    8. Graham, Carol & Pinto, Sergio, 2021. "The geography of desperation in America: Labor force participation, mobility, place, and well-being," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 270(C).
    9. Zhu Yan & Jing Jian Xiao & Qiong Sun, 2024. "Moving up toward sustainable development: Digital finance and income mobility," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(5), pages 5742-5763, October.
    10. Zheng, Hui & Choi, Yoonyoung & Dirlam, Jonathan & George, Linda, 2022. "Rising childhood income inequality and declining Americans’ health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 303(C).
    11. Arčabić, Vladimir & Kim, Kyoung Tae & You, Yu & Lee, Junsoo, 2021. "Century-long dynamics and convergence of income inequality among the US states," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    12. Campos-Vazquez, Raymundo M. & Krozer, Alice & Ramírez-Álvarez, Aurora A. & de la Torre, Rodolfo & Velez-Grajales, Roberto, 2022. "Perceptions of inequality and social mobility in Mexico," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    13. Patricia Funjika & Rachel M. Gisselquist, 2020. "Social mobility and inequality between groups," WIDER Working Paper Series wp2020-12, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    14. repec:osf:socarx:gdz2a_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Luo, Weixiang & Xie, Yu, 2020. "Economic growth, income inequality and life expectancy in China," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 256(C).
    16. Lucas Chancel, 2019. "Ten facts about income inequality in advanced economies," Working Papers hal-02876982, HAL.
    17. Mishra, Sandeep & Carleton, R. Nicholas, 2015. "Subjective relative deprivation is associated with poorer physical and mental health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 147(C), pages 144-149.
    18. Tharcisio Leone, 2022. "The geography of intergenerational mobility: Evidence of educational persistence and the “Great Gatsby Curve” in Brazil," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(3), pages 1227-1251, August.
    19. Fehr, Dietmar & Rau, Hannes & Trautmann, Stefan T. & Xu, Yilong, 2020. "Inequality, fairness and social capital," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 129(C).
    20. Tommy Haugan & Sally Muggleton & Arnhild Myhr, 2021. "Psychological distress in late adolescence: The role of inequalities in family affluence and municipal socioeconomic characteristics in Norway," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(7), pages 1-25, July.
    21. Silvia Mendolia & Peter Siminski, 2016. "New Estimates of Intergenerational Mobility in Australia," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 92(298), pages 361-373, September.

    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:eee:socmed:v:366:y:2025:i:c:s0277953625000115. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    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.