IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hai/wpaper/202101.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Intergenerational Transmission of Mental and Physical Health in the United Kingdom

Author

Listed:
  • Panka Bencsik

    (University of Chicago)

  • Timothy J. Halliday

    (University of Hawai‘i)

  • Bhashkar Mazumder

    (Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago)

Abstract

We estimate intergenerational health persistence in the United Kingdom using Quality Adjusted Life Years (QALY), a broad measure of health derived from the SF-12 Survey. We estimate that both the rank-rank slope and the intergenerational health association (IHA) are 0.21. We use components of the SF-12 to create mental and physical health indices and find that mental health is at least as persistent across generations as physical health. Importantly, parents’ mental health is much more strongly associated with children's health than parents’ physical health indicating that mental health might be a more important transmission channel. Finally, we construct an overall measure of welfare that combines income and health, and estimate a rank-rank association of 0.31. This is considerably lower than a comparable estimate of 0.43 for the US, suggesting greater mobility of overall welfare in the UK than the US.

Suggested Citation

  • Panka Bencsik & Timothy J. Halliday & Bhashkar Mazumder, 2021. "The Intergenerational Transmission of Mental and Physical Health in the United Kingdom," Working Papers 202101, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hai:wpaper:202101
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.economics.hawaii.edu/research/workingpapers/WP_21-01.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2021
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Moser, Petra & Biasi, Barbara & Dahl, Michael S, 2021. "Career Effects of Mental Health," CEPR Discussion Papers 16401, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    2. John E. Roemer & Alain Trannoy, 2016. "Equality of Opportunity: Theory and Measurement," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 54(4), pages 1288-1332, December.
    3. Sandra E. Black & Paul J. Devereux & Kjell G. Salvanes, 2007. "From the Cradle to the Labor Market? The Effect of Birth Weight on Adult Outcomes," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(1), pages 409-439.
    4. Halliday, Timothy & Mazumder, Bhashkar & Wong, Ashley, 2021. "Intergenerational mobility in self-reported health status in the US," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    5. Bhashkar Mazumder, 2005. "Fortunate Sons: New Estimates of Intergenerational Mobility in the United States Using Social Security Earnings Data," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 87(2), pages 235-255, May.
    6. Maria L. Loureiro & Anna Sanz-de-Galdeano & Daniela Vuri, 2010. "Smoking Habits: Like Father, Like Son, Like Mother, Like Daughter?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 72(6), pages 717-743, December.
    7. Charles I. Jones & Peter J. Klenow, 2016. "Beyond GDP? Welfare across Countries and Time," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2426-2457, September.
    8. Douglas Almond & Janet Currie & Valentina Duque, 2018. "Childhood Circumstances and Adult Outcomes: Act II," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 56(4), pages 1360-1446, December.
    9. Anne Case & Christina Paxson, 2005. "Sex differences in morbidity and mortality," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 42(2), pages 189-214, May.
    10. Gabriella Conti, 2013. "The Developmental Origins of Health Inequality," Research on Economic Inequality, in: Health and Inequality, volume 21, pages 285-309, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    11. 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.
    12. Deaton, Angus S & Paxson, Christina H, 1998. "Aging and Inequality in Income and Health," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 248-253, May.
    13. Johnston, David W. & Schurer, Stefanie & Shields, Michael A., 2013. "Exploring the intergenerational persistence of mental health: Evidence from three generations," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 1077-1089.
    14. Brazier, John & Roberts, Jennifer & Deverill, Mark, 2002. "The estimation of a preference-based measure of health from the SF-36," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 21(2), pages 271-292, March.
    15. Janet Currie & Enrico Moretti, 2007. "Biology as Destiny? Short- and Long-Run Determinants of Intergenerational Transmission of Birth Weight," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 25(2), pages 231-264.
    16. Carsten Andersen, 2019. "Intergenerational Health Mobility: Evidence from Danish Registers," Economics Working Papers 2019-04, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    17. 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.
    18. Lundborg, Petter & Nilsson, Anton & Rooth, Dan-Olof, 2014. "Adolescent health and adult labor market outcomes," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 25-40.
    19. de Paula, Aureo & Attanasio, Orazio & Toppeta, Alessandro, 2020. "The Persistence of Socio-Emotional Skills Life Cycle and Intergenerational Evidence," CEPR Discussion Papers 15254, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    20. Timothy J. Halliday & Bhashkar Mazumder & Ashley Wong, 2020. "The intergenerational transmission of health in the United States: A latent variables analysis," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 367-381, March.
    21. Wang, Huixia & Wang, Chenggang & Halliday, Timothy J., 2018. "Health and health inequality during the great recession: Evidence from the PSID," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 29(C), pages 17-30.
    22. Jason Fletcher & Katie M. Jajtner, 2021. "Intergenerational health mobility: Magnitudes and Importance of Schools and Place," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(7), pages 1648-1667, July.
    23. Sen, Amartya, 1998. "Mortality as an Indicator of Economic Success and Failure," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(446), pages 1-25, January.
    24. Bhashkar Mazumder, 2016. "Estimating the Intergenerational Elasticity and Rank Association in the United States: Overcoming the Current Limitations of Tax Data☆," Research in Labor Economics, in: Inequality: Causes and Consequences, volume 43, pages 83-129, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    25. Johnson Rucker C & Schoeni Robert F, 2011. "The Influence of Early-Life Events on Human Capital, Health Status, and Labor Market Outcomes Over the Life Course," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 11(3), pages 1-57, September.
    26. Akbulut-Yuksel, Mevlude & Kugler, Adriana D., 2016. "Intergenerational persistence of health: Do immigrants get healthier as they remain in the U.S. for more generations?," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 136-148.
    27. 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.
    28. Case, Anne & Fertig, Angela & Paxson, Christina, 2005. "The lasting impact of childhood health and circumstance," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(2), pages 365-389, March.
    29. Marta Pascual & David Cantarero, 2009. "Intergenerational health mobility: an empirical approach based on the ECHP," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 41(4), pages 451-458.
    30. Lindahl, Mikael & Lundberg, Evelina & Palme, Mårten & Simeonova, Emilia, 2016. "Parental Influences on Health and Longevity: Lessons from a Large Sample of Adoptees," Working Paper Series, Center for Labor Studies 2016:3, Uppsala University, Department of Economics.
    31. Kim, Younoh & Sikoki, Bondan & Strauss, John & Witoelar, Firman, 2015. "Intergenerational correlations of health among older adults: Empirical evidence from Indonesia," The Journal of the Economics of Ageing, Elsevier, vol. 6(C), pages 44-56.
    32. Orazio Attanasio & Áureo de Paula & Alessandro Toppeta, 2020. "Intergenerational Mobility in Socio-emotional Skills," NBER Working Papers 27823, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    33. Angus S. Deaton & Christina Paxson, 1998. "Health, Income, and Inequality over the Life Cycle," NBER Chapters, in: Frontiers in the Economics of Aging, pages 431-462, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    34. Solon, Gary, 1992. "Intergenerational Income Mobility in the United States," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 82(3), pages 393-408, June.
    35. Richard Arneson, 2018. "Four Conceptions of Equal Opportunity," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(612), pages 152-173.
    36. Ahlburg, Dennis, 1998. "Intergenerational Transmission of Health," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 88(2), pages 265-270, May.
    37. Classen, Timothy J., 2010. "Measures of the intergenerational transmission of body mass index between mothers and their children in the United States, 1981-2004," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 8(1), pages 30-43, March.
    38. repec:ucn:wpaper:10197/317 is not listed on IDEAS
    39. Richard Arneson, 2018. "Four Conceptions of Equal Opportunity," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 128(612), pages 152-173, July.
    40. Carsten Andersen, 2021. "Intergenerational health mobility: Evidence from Danish registers," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(12), pages 3186-3202, December.
    41. Eriksson, Tor & Pan, Jay & Qin, Xuezheng, 2014. "The intergenerational inequality of health in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 392-409.
    42. Owen Thompson, 2017. "Gene–Environment Interaction in the Intergenerational Transmission of Asthma," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(11), pages 1337-1352, November.
    43. repec:eme:rlec11:s0147-912120160000043012 is not listed on IDEAS
    44. Michael Darden & Donna Gilleskie, 2016. "The Effects of Parental Health Shocks on Adult Offspring Smoking Behavior and Self‐Assessed Health," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(8), pages 939-954, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michaela Benzeval & Thomas F. Crossley & Edith Aguirre, 2023. "A symposium on Understanding Society, the UK Household Longitudinal Study: introduction," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 44(4), pages 317-340, December.
    2. Costi, C.; & Migali, G.; & Zucchelli, E.;, 2024. "Intergenerational persistence of education, smoking and birth weight: evidence from three generations," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 24/02, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    3. Barschkett, M.; & Bosque-Mercader, L.;, 2024. "Building Health across Generations: Childbirth, Childcare and Maternal Health," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 24/08, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.

    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. Halliday, Timothy & Mazumder, Bhashkar & Wong, Ashley, 2021. "Intergenerational mobility in self-reported health status in the US," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 193(C).
    2. Jason Fletcher & Katie M. Jajtner, 2021. "Intergenerational health mobility: Magnitudes and Importance of Schools and Place," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(7), pages 1648-1667, July.
    3. Timothy J. Halliday & Bhashkar Mazumder & Ashley Wong, 2020. "The intergenerational transmission of health in the United States: A latent variables analysis," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 29(3), pages 367-381, March.
    4. Carsten Andersen, 2021. "Intergenerational health mobility: Evidence from Danish registers," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(12), pages 3186-3202, December.
    5. Fletcher, Jason & Jajtner, Katie M., 2023. "Multidimensional intergenerational mobility," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 328(C).
    6. Akbulut-Yuksel, Mevlude & Kugler, Adriana D., 2016. "Intergenerational persistence of health: Do immigrants get healthier as they remain in the U.S. for more generations?," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 23(C), pages 136-148.
    7. Carsten Andersen, 2019. "Intergenerational Health Mobility: Evidence from Danish Registers," Economics Working Papers 2019-04, Department of Economics and Business Economics, Aarhus University.
    8. Johnston, David W. & Schurer, Stefanie & Shields, Michael A., 2013. "Exploring the intergenerational persistence of mental health: Evidence from three generations," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 1077-1089.
    9. Heather Brown, 2020. "Understanding the role of policy on inequalities in the intergenerational correlation in health and wages: Evidence from the UK from 1991–2017," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(6), pages 1-16, June.
    10. Noghanibehambari, Hamid, 2022. "Intergenerational health effects of Medicaid," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 45(C).
    11. Johnston, David W. & Schurer, Stefanie & Shields, Michael A., 2011. "Evidence on the Long Shadow of Poor Mental Health across Three Generations," IZA Discussion Papers 6014, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Chang, Harrison & Halliday, Timothy J. & Lin, Ming-Jen & Mazumder, Bhashkar, 2023. "Estimating Intergenerational Health Transmission in Taiwan with Administrative Health Records," IZA Discussion Papers 16543, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Huong Thu Le & Ha Trong Nguyen, 2015. "Intergenerational Transmission in Health: Causal estimates from fixed effects instrumental variables models for two cohorts of Australian children," Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre Working Paper series WP1509, Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre (BCEC), Curtin Business School.
    14. Thompson, Owen, 2014. "Genetic mechanisms in the intergenerational transmission of health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 132-146.
    15. Chang, Harrison & Halliday, Timothy J. & Lin, Ming-Jen & Mazumder, Bhashkar, 2024. "Estimating intergenerational health transmission in Taiwan with administrative health records," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 238(C).
    16. Cobb-Clark, Deborah A. & Dahmann, Sarah C. & Salamanca, Nicolás & Zhu, Anna, 2022. "Intergenerational disadvantage: Learning about equal opportunity from social assistance receipt," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    17. Cassandra Robertson & Rourke O’Brien, 2018. "Health Endowment at Birth and Variation in Intergenerational Economic Mobility: Evidence From U.S. County Birth Cohorts," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 55(1), pages 249-269, February.
    18. Gabriella Conti & Mark Hanson & Hazel Inskip & Sarah Crozier & Cyrus Cooper & Keith Godfrey, 2018. "Beyond Birth Weight: The Origins of Human Capital," Working Papers 2018-089, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    19. Rozinskaya, N. & Drobyshevskaya, T., 2022. "Quantitative estimates of intergenerational mobility," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 57(5), pages 93-111.
    20. Maystadt, Jean-François & Migali, Giuseppe, 2021. "The transmission of health across 7 generations in China, 1789–1906," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    intergenerational health mobility; mental health; physical health; United Kingdom;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • F16 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade and Labor Market Interactions
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials

    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:hai:wpaper:202101. 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: Web Technician (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deuhius.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.