TY - JOUR T1 - Healthy, wealthy, and wise? Tests for direct casual paths between health and socioeconomic status JF - Journal of Econometrics Y1 - 2003 A1 - Adams, Peter A1 - Michael D Hurd A1 - Daniel McFadden A1 - Merrill, Angela A1 - Ribeiro, Tiago KW - Demographics KW - Health Conditions and Status KW - Socioeconomic factors AB - This paper provides statistical methods that permit the association of socioeconomic status and health to be partially unraveled in panel data by excluding some postulated causal paths, or delimiting their range of action. These methods are applied to the Asset and Health Dynamics of the Oldest Old (AHEAD) Panel to test for the absence of causal links from socioeconomic status (SES) to health innovations and mortality, and from health conditions to innovations in wealth. We conclude that in this elderly American population, where Medicare covers most acute care and pension income is not affected by ability to work, the evidence supports the hypothesis of no direct causal link from SES to mortality and to incidence of most sudden onset health conditions (accidents and some acute conditions), once initial health conditions are controlled, but there is an association of SES with incidence of gradual onset health conditions (mental conditions, and some degenerative and chronic conditions), due either to causal links or to persistent unobserved behavioral or genetic factors that have a common influence on both SES and innovations in health. There is little evidence to support a broad association of health conditions and wealth changes. The death of a spouse appears to have a negative effect on the wealth of the survivor; this is plausibly a direct causal effect. There is evidence for some association of health conditions with increased dissaving from liquid wealth for intact couples and singles. From these findings, we conclude that there is no evidence that SES-linked therapies for acute diseases induce mortality differentials. The question of whether SES linked preventative care influences onset of chronic and mental diseases remains open. PB - 112 VL - 112 UR - http://emlab.berkeley.edu/users/mjansson/Courses/ECON242_SPRING02/McFadden.pdf IS - 1 N1 - RDA; National Institute on Aging through a grant to the NBER Program Project on the Economics of Aging (P01-AG 05842) ER - TY - CHAP T1 - Consumption and Saving Balances of the Elderly: Experimental Evidence on Survey Response Bias T2 - Frontiers in the Economics of Aging Y1 - 1998 A1 - Michael D Hurd A1 - Daniel McFadden A1 - Chand, Harish A1 - Gan, Li A1 - Merrill, Angela A1 - Michael Ewing Roberts ED - David A Wise KW - Consumption and Savings KW - Methodology AB - A prerequisite for understanding the economic behavior of the elderly, and the impacts of public policy on their health and well-being, is accurate data on key economic variables such as income, consumption, and assets, as well as on expectations regarding future economic and demographic events such as major health costs, disabilities, and death. Standard practice is to elicit such information in economic surveys, relying on respondents’ statements regarding the variables in question. Economists are generally aware that stated responses are noisy. Item nonresponse is a common problem, and carefully done surveys are designed to minimize it. Well-designed analyses of economic survey data are careful about detecting implausible outliers, imputing missing values, and correcting for selection caused by dropping missing observations. Circumstances are recognized that tend to produce systematic biases in response, such as telescoping in recall of past events that arises from the psychophysical perception of time intervals, or overstatement of charitable contributions that arises from the incentive to project a positive self-image. Nevertheless, economic studies are often too sanguine about the reliability of subjects’ statements regarding objective economic data. JF - Frontiers in the Economics of Aging PB - Univ. of Chicago Press CY - Chicago UR - https://www.nber.org/chapters/c7306 N1 - ProCite field 8 : ed. U4 - Consumption/Savings/Survey Methods JO - Consumption and Saving Balances of the Elderly: Experimental Evidence on Survey Response Bias ER -