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Socioeconomic status and health: A new approach to the measurement of bivariate inequality

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  • ERREYGERS, Guido
  • KESSELS, Roselinde

Abstract

We suggest an alternative way to construct a family of indices of socioeconomic inequality of health. Our indices belong to the broad category of linear indices. In contrast to rank-dependent indices, which are designed in terms of the ranks of the socioeconomic variable and the levels of the health variable, our indices are based on the levels of both the socioeconomic and the health variable. We also indicate how the indices can be modified in order to introduce sensitivity to inequality in the socioeconomic distribution and to inequality in the health distribution. As an empirical illustration, we make a comparative study of the relation between income and well-being in 16 European countries using data from SHARE Wave 4.

Suggested Citation

  • ERREYGERS, Guido & KESSELS, Roselinde, 2015. "Socioeconomic status and health: A new approach to the measurement of bivariate inequality," Working Papers 2015017, University of Antwerp, Faculty of Business and Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:ant:wpaper:2015017
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    22. Guido Erreygers & Philip Clarke & Qiong Zheng, 2017. "On the measurement of socioeconomic inequality of health between countries," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 15(2), pages 175-193, June.
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    Cited by:

    1. Guido Erreygers & Philip Clarke & Qiong Zheng, 2017. "On the measurement of socioeconomic inequality of health between countries," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 15(2), pages 175-193, June.
    2. Robson, Matthew & O’Donnell, Owen & Van Ourti, Tom, 2024. "Aversion to health inequality — Pure, income-related and income-caused," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(C).
    3. Roselinde Kessels & Guido Erreygers, 2014. "A unified structural equation modeling approach for the decomposition of rank-dependent indicators of socioeconomic inequality of health," EcoMod2014 7065, EcoMod.
    4. Ji-Yeon Shin & Jiseun Lim & Myung Ki & Yeong-Jun Song & Heeran Chun & Dongjin Kim, 2018. "An Assessment of Magnitudes and Patterns of Socioeconomic Inequalities across Various Health Problems: A Large National Cross-Sectional Survey in Korea," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-13, December.
    5. Roselinde Kessels & Guido Erreygers, 2014. "A unified structural equation modeling approach for the decomposition of rank-dependent indicators of socioeconomic inequality of health," EcoMod2014 7065, EcoMod.
    6. Roselinde Kessels & Guido Erreygers, 2016. "Structural equation modeling for decomposing rank-dependent indicators of socioeconomic inequality of health: an empirical study," Health Economics Review, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 1-13, December.
    7. Camilla Sortsø & Jørgen Lauridsen & Martha Emneus & Anders Green & Peter Bjødstrup Jensen, 2017. "Socioeconomic inequality of diabetes patients’ health care utilization in Denmark," Health Economics Review, Springer, vol. 7(1), pages 1-22, December.
    8. Alexander Silbersdorff & Kai Sebastian Schneider, 2019. "Distributional Regression Techniques in Socioeconomic Research on the Inequality of Health with an Application on the Relationship between Mental Health and Income," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(20), pages 1-28, October.
    9. Kjell Arne Brekke & Snorre Kverndokk, 2024. "Health, Income, and Measures of Inequality – Why Inequality May Decline When All Inequality Measures Indicate the Opposite," CESifo Working Paper Series 11318, CESifo.
    10. Guido Erreygers & Roselinde Kessels & Linkun Chen & Philip Clarke, 2016. "Decomposing Socioeconomic Inequality of Health," EcoMod2016 9574, EcoMod.
    11. Christiansen, Terkel & Lauridsen, Jørgen T., 2016. "Dynamic Changes in Determinants of Inequalities in Health in Europe with Focus on Retired - with Particular Regard to Retired Danes," DaCHE discussion papers 2016:8, University of Southern Denmark, Dache - Danish Centre for Health Economics.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Inequality measurement; Socioeconomic inequality of health; Bivariate inequality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • I00 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - General - - - General

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