IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/lis/liswps/637.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

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

Author

Listed:
  • Johan Fritzell
  • Johan Rehnberg
  • Jennie Bacchus Hertzman
  • Jenni Blomgren

Abstract

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.

Suggested Citation

  • Johan Fritzell & Johan Rehnberg & Jennie Bacchus Hertzman & Jenni Blomgren, 2015. "Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality," LIS Working papers 637, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    • Handle: RePEc:lis:liswps:637
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.lisdatacenter.org/wps/liswps/637.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Beck, Nathaniel & Katz, Jonathan N., 1995. "What To Do (and Not to Do) with Time-Series Cross-Section Data," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 89(3), pages 634-647, September.
    2. Johan Fritzell & Olli Kangas & Jennie Bacchus Hertzman & Jenni Blomgren & Heikki Hiilamo, 2013. "Cross-Temporal and Cross-National Poverty and Mortality Rates among Developed Countries," LIS Working papers 582, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.
    3. Tony Atkinson & Bea Cantillon & Eric Marlier & Brian Nolan, 2002. "Indicators for Social Inclusion," Politica economica, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 1, pages 7-28.
    4. Johan Mackenbach & Caspar Looman, 2013. "Changing patterns of mortality in 25 European countries and their economic and political correlates, 1955–1989," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 58(6), pages 811-823, December.
    5. Atkinson, Tony & Cantillon, Bea & Marlier, Eric & Nolan, Brian, 2002. "Social Indicators: The EU and Social Inclusion," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199253494, Decembrie.
    6. Oliver Razum & Sven Voigtländer & Ursula Berger, 2014. "Explaining health inequalities: the role of space and time," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 59(3), pages 425-426, June.
    7. Babones, Salvatore J., 2008. "Income inequality and population health: Correlation and causality," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 66(7), pages 1614-1626, April.
    8. 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.
    9. Nelson, Kenneth & Fritzell, Johan, 2014. "Welfare states and population health: The role of minimum income benefits for mortality," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 63-71.
    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. Sascha O. Becker & Amma Panin & Steven J. Pfaff & Jared Rubin, 2025. "Religion and Economic Development: Past, Present, and Future," Working Papers 25-01, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    2. Dandara Ramos & Nívea B da Silva & Maria Yury Ichihara & Rosemeire L Fiaccone & Daniela Almeida & Samila Sena & Poliana Rebouças & Elzo Pereira Pinto Júnior & Enny S Paixão & Sanni Ali & Laura C Rodri, 2021. "Conditional cash transfer program and child mortality: A cross-sectional analysis nested within the 100 Million Brazilian Cohort," PLOS Medicine, Public Library of Science, vol. 18(9), pages 1-20, September.
    3. Decerf,Benoit Marie A, 2022. "Normative Indicators Combining Poverty and Mortality : A Survey," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10042, The World Bank.
    4. Baltica Cabieses & Richard Cookson & Manuel Espinoza & Gillian Santorelli & Iris Delgado, 2015. "Did Socioeconomic Inequality in Self-Reported Health in Chile Fall after the Equity-Based Healthcare Reform of 2005? A Concentration Index Decomposition Analysis," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(9), pages 1-21, September.
    5. Waziri, Salisu Ibrahim & Mohamed Nor, Norashidah & Law, Siong Hook & Hassan, Azman, 2018. "Access to Safe Drinking Water, Good Sanitation, Occurrence of Under-Five Mortality and Standard of Living in Developing Countries: System GMM Approach," Jurnal Ekonomi Malaysia, Faculty of Economics and Business, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, vol. 52(2), pages 279-289.
    6. Edward B. Barbier & Jacob P. Hochard, 2019. "Poverty-Environment Traps," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 74(3), pages 1239-1271, November.

    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. Johan Fritzell & Johan Rehnberg & Jennie Bacchus Hertzman & Jenni Blomgren, 2015. "Absolute or relative? A comparative analysis of the relationship between poverty and mortality," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 60(1), pages 101-110, January.
    2. Duclos, Jean-Yves & Araar, Abdelkrim & Giles, John, 2010. "Chronic and transient poverty: Measurement and estimation, with evidence from China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(2), pages 266-277, March.
    3. Manos Matsaganis & Chrysa Leventi, 2011. "The distributional impact of the crisis in Greece," DEOS Working Papers 1124, Athens University of Economics and Business.
    4. Menon Martina & Perali Federico & Veronesi Marcella, 2017. "“Leaving No Child Behind:” Preferences for Social Inclusion and Altruism," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 17(3), pages 1-19, July.
    5. Sabina Alkire & Maria Emma Santos, 2010. "Acute Multidimensional Poverty: A New Index for Developing Countries," Human Development Research Papers (2009 to present) HDRP-2010-11, Human Development Report Office (HDRO), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).
    6. Alkire, Sabina & Santos, Maria Emma, 2014. "Measuring Acute Poverty in the Developing World: Robustness and Scope of the Multidimensional Poverty Index," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 251-274.
    7. Vani K. Borooah & Paddy Hillyard & Mike Tomlinson, 2006. "Equity‐Sensitive Indicators Of Living Standards With An Application To Northern Ireland," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 53(5), pages 616-635, November.
    8. Wei Su & Gianni Betti & Baris Ucar, 2020. "Longitudinal measures of fuzzy poverty: a focus on Czechia, Hungary and Poland after the crisis," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 54(1), pages 27-41, February.
    9. Vincent Hildebrand & Philippe Kerm, 2009. "Income inequality and self-rated health status: Evidence from the european community household panel," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 46(4), pages 805-825, November.
    10. Espinoza-Delgado, José & López-Laborda, Julio, 2017. "Nicaragua: evolución de la pobreza multidimensional, 2001-2009," Revista CEPAL, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL), April.
    11. Bea Cantillon, 2010. "Disambiguating Lisbon. Growth, Employment and Social Inclusion in the Investment State," Working Papers 1007, Herman Deleeck Centre for Social Policy, University of Antwerp.
    12. Brandolini, Andrea & Micklewright, John, 2020. "Tony Atkinson's New Book, Measuring Poverty around the World: Some Further Reflections," IZA Discussion Papers 12890, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Sabina Alkire & Suman Seth, 2013. "Selecting a Targeting Method to Identify BPL Households in India," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 112(2), pages 417-446, June.
    14. H. Xavier Jara & Erik Schokkaert, 2017. "Putting measures of individual well-being to use for ex-ante policy evaluation," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 15(4), pages 421-440, December.
    15. Tim Goedemé & Karel Van den Bosch & Lina Salanauskaite & Gerlinde Verbist, 2013. "Testing the Statistical Significance of Microsimulation Results: Often Easier than You Think. A Technical Note," ImPRovE Working Papers 13/10, Herman Deleeck Centre for Social Policy, University of Antwerp.
    16. Pierre Pestieau, 2009. "Assessing The Performance Of The Public Sector," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 80(1), pages 133-161, March.
    17. Miki Malul & Daniel Shapira & Amir Shoham, 2013. "Practical modified Gini index," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(4), pages 324-327, March.
    18. Andrea Garnero & Stephan Kampelmann & François Rycx, 2015. "Sharp Teeth or Empty Mouths? European Institutional Diversity and the Sector-Level Minimum Wage Bite," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 53(4), pages 760-788, December.
    19. Johan Fritzell & Olli Kangas & Jennie Bacchus-hertzman & Blomgren, J. (Jenni), 2012. "GINI DP 64: Cross-Temporal and Cross-National Poverty and Mortality Rates among Developed Countries," GINI Discussion Papers 64, AIAS, Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Labour Studies.
    20. Alfio Cerami, 2003. "The Impact of Social Transfers in Central and Eastern Europe," LIS Working papers 356, LIS Cross-National Data Center in Luxembourg.

    More about this item

    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:lis:liswps:637. 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: Piotr Paradowski (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lisprlu.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.