IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/eujhec/v14y2013i3p431-442.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Welfare-related health inequality: does the choice of measure matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Joachim Frick
  • Nicolas Ziebarth

Abstract

Using representative microdata from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP), we show that the welfare measure choice has a substantial impact on the degree of welfare-related health inequality. To assess the sensitivity of welfare-related health inequality measures, we combine a unique set of income and wealth measures with different subjective, cardinalized, and (quasi-)objective health measures. The influence of the welfare measure is more pronounced when using subjective health measures than when using (quasi-)objective health measures. Copyright Springer-Verlag 2013

Suggested Citation

  • Joachim Frick & Nicolas Ziebarth, 2013. "Welfare-related health inequality: does the choice of measure matter?," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 14(3), pages 431-442, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:eujhec:v:14:y:2013:i:3:p:431-442
    DOI: 10.1007/s10198-012-0387-6
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10198-012-0387-6
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10198-012-0387-6?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. Adam Wagstaff, 2011. "The concentration index of a binary outcome revisited," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(10), pages 1155-1160, October.
    2. Sandy Tubeuf & Florence Jusot, 2011. "Social health inequalities among older Europeans: the contribution of social and family background," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 12(1), pages 61-77, February.
    3. Hai Zhong, 2010. "The impact of missing data in the estimation of concentration index: a potential source of bias," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 11(3), pages 255-266, June.
    4. Joachim R. Frick & Markus M. Grabka & Eva M. Sierminska, 2007. "Representative Wealth Data for Germany from the German SOEP: The Impact of Methodological Decisions around Imputation and the Choice of the Aggregation Unit," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 672, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    5. Erreygers, Guido, 2009. "Correcting the Concentration Index: A reply to Wagstaff," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 521-524, March.
    6. Edward Wolff & Ajit Zacharias, 2009. "Household wealth and the measurement of economic well-being in the United States," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 7(2), pages 83-115, June.
    7. Ann Lecluyse, 2007. "Income-related health inequality in Belgium: a longitudinal perspective," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 8(3), pages 237-243, September.
    8. Joachim R. Frick & Markus M. Grabka & Jan Marcus, 2007. "Editing and Multiple Imputation of Item-Non-Response in the 2002 Wealth Module of the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP)," Data Documentation 18, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    9. Nicolas R. Ziebarth, 2009. "Measurement of Health, the Sensitivity of the Concentration Index, and Reporting Heterogeneity," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 211, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    10. Guido Erreygers & Tom Van Ourti, 2011. "Putting the cart before the horse. A comment on Wagstaff on inequality measurement in the presence of binary variables," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(10), pages 1161-1165, October.
    11. Richard Burkhauser & Shuaizhang Feng & Stephen Jenkins & Jeff Larrimore, 2011. "Estimating trends in US income inequality using the Current Population Survey: the importance of controlling for censoring," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 9(3), pages 393-415, September.
    12. Adam Wagstaff, 2005. "The bounds of the concentration index when the variable of interest is binary, with an application to immunization inequality," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 14(4), pages 429-432, April.
    13. Abul Naga, Ramses H. & Yalcin, Tarik, 2008. "Inequality measurement for ordered response health data," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(6), pages 1614-1625, December.
    14. repec:dau:papers:123456789/5401 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Schmitz, Hendrik, 2011. "Why are the unemployed in worse health? The causal effect of unemployment on health," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(1), pages 71-78, January.
    16. Adam Wagstaff, 2011. "Reply to Guido Erreygers and Tom Van Ourti's comment on ‘The concentration index of a binary outcome revisited’," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(10), pages 1166-1168, October.
    17. Erreygers, Guido & Van Ourti, Tom, 2011. "Measuring socioeconomic inequality in health, health care and health financing by means of rank-dependent indices: A recipe for good practice," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 685-694, July.
    18. Ziebarth, Nicolas, 2010. "Measurement of health, health inequality, and reporting heterogeneity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 116-124, July.
    19. Adam Wagstaff & Naoko Watanabe, 2003. "What difference does the choice of SES make in health inequality measurement?," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 12(10), pages 885-890, October.
    20. Doorslaer, Eddy van & Jones, Andrew M., 2003. "Inequalities in self-reported health: validation of a new approach to measurement," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(1), pages 61-87, January.
    21. Erreygers, Guido, 2009. "Correcting the Concentration Index," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 28(2), pages 504-515, March.
    22. Gert G. Wagner & Joachim R. Frick & Jürgen Schupp, 2007. "The German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP) – Scope, Evolution and Enhancements," Schmollers Jahrbuch : Journal of Applied Social Science Studies / Zeitschrift für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin, vol. 127(1), pages 139-169.
    23. Magnus Lindelow, 2006. "Sometimes more equal than others: how health inequalities depend on the choice of welfare indicator," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(3), pages 263-279, March.
    24. Buhong Zheng, 2011. "A new approach to measure socioeconomic inequality in health," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 9(4), pages 555-577, December.
    25. Udo Schneider & Christian Pfarr & Brit Schneider & Volker Ulrich, 2012. "I feel good! Gender differences and reporting heterogeneity in self-assessed health," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 13(3), pages 251-265, June.
    26. Kakwani, Nanak & Wagstaff, Adam & van Doorslaer, Eddy, 1997. "Socioeconomic inequalities in health: Measurement, computation, and statistical inference," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 87-103, March.
    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. Nicolas R. Ziebarth, 2018. "Social Insurance and Health," Contributions to Economic Analysis, in: Health Econometrics, volume 127, pages 57-84, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.
    2. Peter Eibich, 2014. "Understanding the Effect of Retirement on Health Using Regression Discontinuity Design," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 669, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    3. Eibich, Peter & Ziebarth, Nicolas, 2014. "Examining the Structure of Spatial Health Effects in Germany Using Hierarchical Bayes Models," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 49, pages 305-320.
    4. Coveney, Max & García-Gómez, Pilar & van Doorslaer, Eddy & Van Ourti, Tom, 2020. "Thank goodness for stickiness: Unravelling the evolution of income-related health inequalities before and after the Great Recession in Europe," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    5. Asada, Yukiko & Grignon, Michel & Hurley, Jeremiah & Kirkland, Susan, 2020. "Cautionary tails of grip strength in health inequality studies: An analysis from the Canadian longitudinal study on aging," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 265(C).
    6. Abeliansky, Ana Lucia & Beulmann, Matthias & Prettner, Klaus, 2024. "Are they coming for us? Industrial robots and the mental health of workers," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(3).
    7. Eibich, Peter & Ziebarth, Nicolas R., 2014. "Analyzing regional variation in health care utilization using (rich) household microdata," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 114(1), pages 41-53.
    8. Laia Maynou & Marc Saez & Jordi Bacaria & Guillem Lopez-Casasnovas, 2015. "Health inequalities in the European Union: an empirical analysis of the dynamics of regional differences," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 16(5), pages 543-559, June.
    9. Goebel, Jan & Krekel, Christian & Tiefenbach, Tim & Ziebarth, Nicolas R., 2013. "Natural Disaster, Policy Action, and Mental Well-Being: The Case of Fukushima," IZA Discussion Papers 7691, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Liliya Leopold, 2019. "Health Measurement and Health Inequality Over the Life Course: A Comparison of Self-rated Health, SF-12, and Grip Strength," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 56(2), pages 763-784, April.
    11. Pulok, Mohammad Habibullah & van Gool, Kees & Hall, Jane, 2020. "Horizontal inequity in the utilisation of healthcare services in Australia," Health Policy, Elsevier, vol. 124(11), pages 1263-1271.
    12. Ricardo Rodrigues & Stefania Ilinca & Andrea E. Schmidt, 2018. "Income‐rich and wealth‐poor? The impact of measures of socio‐economic status in the analysis of the distribution of long‐term care use among older people," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(3), pages 637-646, March.
    13. Eibich, Peter, 2015. "Understanding the effect of retirement on health: Mechanisms and heterogeneity," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 1-12.
    14. Nádia Simões & Nuno Crespo & Sandrina B. Moreira & Celeste A. Varum, 2016. "Measurement and determinants of health poverty and richness: evidence from Portugal," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 50(4), pages 1331-1358, June.
    15. Davillas, Apostolos & Pudney, Stephen, 2016. "Concordance of health states in couples. Analysis of self-reported, nurse administered and blood-based biomarker data in Understanding Society," ISER Working Paper Series 2016-15, Institute for Social and Economic Research.

    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. Ziebarth, Nicolas R. & Frick, Joachim R., 2010. "Revisiting the Income-Health Nexus: The Importance of Choosing the," IZA Discussion Papers 4787, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Mohammad Habibullah Pulok & Kees Gool & Mohammad Hajizadeh & Sara Allin & Jane Hall, 2020. "Measuring horizontal inequity in healthcare utilisation: a review of methodological developments and debates," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 21(2), pages 171-180, March.
    3. Erreygers, Guido & Van Ourti, Tom, 2011. "Measuring socioeconomic inequality in health, health care and health financing by means of rank-dependent indices: A recipe for good practice," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 685-694, July.
    4. Ziebarth, Nicolas, 2010. "Measurement of health, health inequality, and reporting heterogeneity," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 71(1), pages 116-124, July.
    5. Kjellsson, Gustav & Gerdtham, Ulf-G., 2013. "On correcting the concentration index for binary variables," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 659-670.
    6. Paul Makdissi & Myra Yazbeck, 2017. "Robust rankings of socioeconomic health inequality using a categorical variable," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(9), pages 1132-1145, September.
    7. Laia Maynou & Marc Saez & Jordi Bacaria & Guillem Lopez-Casasnovas, 2015. "Health inequalities in the European Union: an empirical analysis of the dynamics of regional differences," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 16(5), pages 543-559, June.
    8. Baeten, Steef & Van Ourti, Tom & van Doorslaer, Eddy, 2013. "Rising inequalities in income and health in China: Who is left behind?," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 1214-1229.
    9. Kristof Bosmans, 2016. "Consistent Comparisons of Attainment and Shortfall Inequality: A Critical Examination," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 25(11), pages 1425-1432, November.
    10. Hernández-Quevedo, Cristina & Masseria, Cristina, 2013. "Measuring Income-Related Inequalities in Health in Multi-Country Analysis/Midiendo las desigualdades en salud relacionadas con la renta entre países," Estudios de Economia Aplicada, Estudios de Economia Aplicada, vol. 31, pages 455-476, Septiembr.
    11. Nicolas R. Ziebarth, 2009. "Measurement of Health, the Sensitivity of the Concentration Index, and Reporting Heterogeneity," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 211, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    12. I. Josa & A. Aguado, 2020. "Measuring Unidimensional Inequality: Practical Framework for the Choice of an Appropriate Measure," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 149(2), pages 541-570, June.
    13. Erreygers, Guido & Clarke, Philip & Van Ourti, Tom, 2012. "“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who in this land is fairest of all?”—Distributional sensitivity in the measurement of socioeconomic inequality of health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 257-270.
    14. Nesson, Erik T. & Robinson, Joshua J., 2019. "On the measurement of health and its effect on the measurement of health inequality," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 207-221.
    15. Peng Nie & Andrew E. Clarck & Conchita D'Ambrosio & Lanlin Ding, 2020. "Income-related health inequality in urban China (1991-2015): The role of homeownership and housing conditions," Working Papers 524, ECINEQ, Society for the Study of Economic Inequality.
    16. Nicolas R. Ziebarth & Joachim R. Frick, 2010. "Revisiting the Income-Health Nexus: The Importance of Choosing the "Right" Indicator," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 274, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    17. Derek Asuman & Ama Pokuaa Fenny & Doreen Nyarko Anyamesem Odame, 2021. "Trends and antecedents of inequalities in maternal healthcare coverage in four African countries," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(3), pages 515-544, April.
    18. Adam Wagstaff, 2011. "Reply to Guido Erreygers and Tom Van Ourti's comment on ‘The concentration index of a binary outcome revisited’," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(10), pages 1166-1168, October.
    19. Olufunke Alaba & Lumbwe Chola, 2014. "Socioeconomic Inequalities in Adult Obesity Prevalence in South Africa: A Decomposition Analysis," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-20, March.
    20. Guido Erreygers & Tom Van Ourti, 2011. "Putting the cart before the horse. A comment on Wagstaff on inequality measurement in the presence of binary variables," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(10), pages 1161-1165, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Welfare-related health inequality; Concentration index; Income measurement; Wealth; SOEP; D31; I10; I12;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D31 - Microeconomics - - Distribution - - - Personal Income and Wealth Distribution
    • I10 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - General
    • I12 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Health Behavior

    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:spr:eujhec:v:14:y:2013:i:3:p:431-442. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.