Intergenerational health mobility: an empirical approach based on the ECHP

Abstract

Despite the importance of the study of health mobility, few attempts have been made to measure intergenerational mobility not only in the European Union but also in other countries such as United States. This article is focused on the study of intergenerational health mobility using data from the European community household panel (ECHP). In particular, the relationships between self-assessed health of parents and their sons are analysed. The evidence obtained suggests that, in Spain, sons’ reported health depends significantly on the self-assessed health of their fathers.

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the help given by the Centre for Health Economics (CHE) of the University of York (United Kingdom). Also, we are very grateful for many helpful comments from the participants in the York Seminars in Health Econometrics (YSHE). This work has been partially supported by the Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia (SEJ2004-02810). Finally, the authors acknowledge the financial support of FUNCAS (Fundación de las Cajas de Ahorros). Responsibility for any remaining error lies solely with the authors. A preliminary version of this paper has been previously published as working paper (n°, 245) by Fundación de las Cajas de Ahorros (FUNCAS).

Notes

¹Hauck and Rice (2004) identify whether individuals within different social and economic strata experience differential mobility over time in their respective mental health distributions using the BHPS. Jones and Lopez Nicolas (2004) define an index of health-related income mobility as one minus the ratio by which the concentration index for the joint distribution of longitudinal averages differs from the weighted average of the cross sectional concentration indices.

²Similar results are obtained for the other waves.