IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/yor/hectdg/16-01.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Valuing the benefits from health care interventions using life satisfaction data

Author

Listed:
  • Howley, P.

Abstract

This paper uses life satisfaction data to calculate the extent to which individuals are willing to trade money for improvements in their health status. Using a large nationally representative survey in the UK, I showthat the amount of extra equivalent household income to make someone with a health condition, as well off in terms of life satisfaction as someone without the health condition, ranges from a low of £4,235 per annum for impairments associated with asthma to a high of £31,283 for impairments associated with congestive heart failure. These values could be used as a basis for a cost-benefit analysis of health care interventions aimed at the medical conditions examined. Relative to previous work, I address a number of critical empirical challenges when it comes to using this compensating income variation approach for determining the monetary value of a health improvement. First, I address the issue of income endogeneity in life satisaction by instrumenting income with the educational status of respondents’ parents. Second, I control for the potentially confounding role of personality differences by including a measure of the Big Five personality traits in the micro-econometirc analysis of life satisfaction.

Suggested Citation

  • Howley, P., 2016. "Valuing the benefits from health care interventions using life satisfaction data," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 16/01, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.
    • Handle: RePEc:yor:hectdg:16/01
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.york.ac.uk/media/economics/documents/hedg/workingpapers/1601.pdf
    File Function: Main text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell & Bernard M.S. van Praag, 2002. "The Subjective Costs of Health Losses due to Chronic Diseases," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 02-023/3, Tinbergen Institute.
    2. John Cullinan & Brenda Gannon & Eamon O’Shea, 2013. "The welfare implications of disability for older people in Ireland," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 14(2), pages 171-183, April.
    3. James Murphy & P. Allen & Thomas Stevens & Darryl Weatherhead, 2005. "A Meta-analysis of Hypothetical Bias in Stated Preference Valuation," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 30(3), pages 313-325, March.
    4. Richard Carson & Nicholas Flores & Norman Meade, 2001. "Contingent Valuation: Controversies and Evidence," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 19(2), pages 173-210, June.
    5. Lex Borghans & Angela Lee Duckworth & James J. Heckman & Bas ter Weel, 2008. "The Economics and Psychology of Personality Traits," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 43(4).
    6. Rehdanz, Katrin & Maddison, David, 2005. "Climate and happiness," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 111-125, January.
      • Katrin Rehdanz & David J. Maddison, 2003. "Climate and Happiness," Working Papers FNU-20, Research unit Sustainability and Global Change, Hamburg University, revised Apr 2003.
    7. Bruno S. Frey & Simon Luechinger & Alois Stutzer, "undated". "Valuing Public Goods: The Life Satisfaction Approach," IEW - Working Papers 184, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    8. Levinson, Arik, 2012. "Valuing public goods using happiness data: The case of air quality," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(9-10), pages 869-880.
    9. Erzo F. P. Luttmer, 2005. "Neighbors as Negatives: Relative Earnings and Well-Being," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(3), pages 963-1002.
    10. Emmanouil Mentzakis, 2011. "Allowing for heterogeneity in monetary subjective well‐being valuations," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(3), pages 331-347, March.
    11. Jayson L. Lusk & F. Bailey Norwood, 2009. "An Inferred Valuation Method," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 85(3), pages 500-514.
    12. Dolan, Paul, 2000. "The measurement of health-related quality of life for use in resource allocation decisions in health care," Handbook of Health Economics, in: A. J. Culyer & J. P. Newhouse (ed.), Handbook of Health Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 32, pages 1723-1760, Elsevier.
    13. Andrew E. Clark & Paul Frijters & Michael A. Shields, 2008. "Relative Income, Happiness, and Utility: An Explanation for the Easterlin Paradox and Other Puzzles," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 46(1), pages 95-144, March.
    14. Powdthavee, Nattavudh & van den Berg, Bernard, 2011. "Putting different price tags on the same health condition: Re-evaluating the well-being valuation approach," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 1032-1043.
    15. Luechinger, Simon & Raschky, Paul A., 2009. "Valuing flood disasters using the life satisfaction approach," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(3-4), pages 620-633, April.
    16. van den Berg, Bernard & Fiebig, Denzil G. & Hall, Jane, 2014. "Well-being losses due to care-giving," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 123-131.
    17. Peggy Schyns, 2001. "Income and Satisfaction in Russia," Journal of Happiness Studies, Springer, vol. 2(2), pages 173-204, June.
    18. KNIGHT, John & SONG, Lina & GUNATILAKA, Ramani, 2009. "Subjective well-being and its determinants in rural China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 635-649, December.
    19. Bruno Frey & Simon Luechinger & Alois Stutzer, 2009. "The life satisfaction approach to valuing public goods: The case of terrorism," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 138(3), pages 317-345, March.
    20. Groot, Wim & Maassen van den Brink, Henriëtte, 2004. "A direct method for estimating the compensating income variation for severe headache and migraine," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 305-314, January.
    21. Wim Groot & Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink & Erik Plug, 2004. "Money for health: the equivalent variation of cardiovascular diseases," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(9), pages 859-872, September.
    22. McNamee, Paul & Mendolia, Silvia, 2014. "The effect of chronic pain on life satisfaction: Evidence from Australian data," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 65-73.
    23. Simon Luechinger, 2009. "Valuing Air Quality Using the Life Satisfaction Approach," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 119(536), pages 482-515, March.
    24. Ada Ferrer‐i‐Carbonell & Bernard M.S. van Praag, 2002. "The subjective costs of health losses due to chronic diseases. An alternative model for monetary appraisal," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(8), pages 709-722, December.
    25. J. Cullinan & B. Gannon & S. Lyons, 2011. "Estimating the extra cost of living for people with disabilities," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 20(5), pages 582-599, May.
    26. Nancy Devlin & David Parkin, 2004. "Does NICE have a cost‐effectiveness threshold and what other factors influence its decisions? A binary choice analysis," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(5), pages 437-452, May.
    27. Pudney, Stephen & Hancock, Ruth & Morciano, Marcello, 2013. "Nonparametric estimation of a compensating variation: the cost of disability," ISER Working Paper Series 2013-26, Institute for Social and Economic Research.
    28. Dolan, Paul & Peasgood, Tessa & White, Mathew, 2008. "Do we really know what makes us happy A review of the economic literature on the factors associated with subjective well-being," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 94-122, February.
    29. Ehsan Latif, 2012. "Monetary valuation of cardiovascular disease in Canada," Economics and Business Letters, Oviedo University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 46-52.
    30. Nattavudh Powdthavee, 2009. "Estimating the Causal Effects of Income on Happiness," Discussion Papers 09/02, Department of Economics, University of York.
    31. Wim Groot & Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink, 2006. "The compensating income variation of cardiovascular disease," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 15(10), pages 1143-1148, October.
    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. Sebastian Himmler & Job Exel & Werner Brouwer, 2020. "Estimating the monetary value of health and capability well-being applying the well-being valuation approach," The European Journal of Health Economics, Springer;Deutsche Gesellschaft für Gesundheitsökonomie (DGGÖ), vol. 21(8), pages 1235-1244, 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. Howley, Peter, 2017. "Less money or better health? Evaluating individual’s willingness to make trade-offs using life satisfaction data," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 53-65.
    2. Ólafsdóttir, Thorhildur & Ásgeirsdóttir, Tinna Laufey & Norton, Edward C., 2020. "Valuing pain using the subjective well-being method," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 37(C).
    3. Powdthavee, Nattavudh & van den Berg, Bernard, 2011. "Putting different price tags on the same health condition: Re-evaluating the well-being valuation approach," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(5), pages 1032-1043.
    4. Marcin Piekałkiewicz, 2017. "Why do economists study happiness?," The Economic and Labour Relations Review, , vol. 28(3), pages 361-377, September.
    5. Dolan, Paul & Fujiwara, Daniel & Metcalfe, Robert, 2011. "A step towards valuing utility the marginal and cardinal way," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 121714, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Katrin Rehdanz & Welsch Heinz & Daiju Naritaa & Toshihiro Okubod, 2013. "Well-being effects of a major negative externality: The case of Fukushima," Working Papers V-358-13, University of Oldenburg, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2013.
    7. Levinson, Arik, 2012. "Valuing public goods using happiness data: The case of air quality," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(9-10), pages 869-880.
    8. Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Stutzer, Alois, 2014. "Economic Approaches to Understanding Change in Happiness," IZA Discussion Papers 8131, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Byela Tibesigwa & Martine Visser & Brennan Hodkinson, 2016. "Effects of Objective and Subjective Income Comparisons on Subjective Wellbeing," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 128(1), pages 361-389, August.
    10. Ehsan Latif, 2012. "Monetary valuation of cardiovascular disease in Canada," Economics and Business Letters, Oviedo University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 46-52.
    11. Arik Levinson, 2013. "Happiness, Behavioral Economics, and Public Policy," NBER Working Papers 19329, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Odermatt, Reto & Stutzer, Alois, 2017. "Subjective Well-Being and Public Policy," IZA Discussion Papers 11102, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    13. Rehdanz, Katrin & Welsch, Heinz & Narita, Daiju & Okubo, Toshihiro, 2015. "Well-being effects of a major natural disaster: The case of Fukushima," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 500-517.
    14. Timothy Tyler Brown, 2013. "A monetary valuation of individual religious behaviour: the case of prayer," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(15), pages 2031-2037, May.
    15. McDonald, Rebecca & Powdthavee, Nattavudh, 2018. "The Shadow Prices of Voluntary Caregiving: Using Panel Data of Well-Being to Estimate the Cost of Informal Care," IZA Discussion Papers 11545, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    16. Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell, 2013. "Happiness economics," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 4(1), pages 35-60, March.
    17. Paul McNamee & Silvia Mendolia & Oleg Yerokhin, 2021. "The transmission of partner mental health to individual life satisfaction: Estimates from a longitudinal household survey," Scottish Journal of Political Economy, Scottish Economic Society, vol. 68(4), pages 494-516, September.
    18. Alpaslan Akay & Olivier Bargain & Mathias Dolls & Dirk Neumann & Andreas Peichl & Sebastian Siegloch, 2012. "Happy Taxpayers? Income Taxation and Well-Being," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 526, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    19. Baldursdottir, Kristjana & Asgeirsdottir, Tinna Laufey & Olafsdottir, Thorhildur, 2023. "How sensitive is the compensating income variation to severity and adaptation?," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 49(C).
    20. Dusanee Kesavayuth & Robert Rosenman & Vasileios Zikos, 2013. "Does Personality Affect how People Perceive their Health?," Working Papers 2013-13, School of Economic Sciences, Washington State University.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    life satisfaction; compensating income variation; instrumental variables; health conditions;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • I1 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health
    • I31 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General Welfare, Well-Being

    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:yor:hectdg:16/01. 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: Jane Rawlings (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/deyoruk.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.