Unemployment and health in macro-social analysis.
The hypothesis that unemployment is related to bad health arises from a general acceptance of the relationship between living standards and longevity. To confirm the hypothesis three analytical statements have to be true: (a) an increase of prosperity leads to a decrease of mortality; (b) a decrease of prosperity leads to an increase of mortality; (c) people with the relatively lowest prosperity, in this case the unemployed, have the relatively highest mortality and so are the least healthy. For this purpose important types of macro-social research are described and the results are interpreted, briefly evaluated and discussed. Research comparing differences in life-expectancy in rich and poor countries, shows rough differences; Research applying a new method, diffusionalist comparison, shows that increased prosperity does not infinitely lead to improvement of life expectancy; Research on economic fluctuations and mortality is the only type of research attempting to describe a process, not a state of affairs; Research on socio-economic categories within countries (classes, neighborhoods) shows differences in mortality and morbidity, but not why these differences exist; Research on the relationship between a population's body height (as a health indicator) and poverty/unemployment gives rise to more differentiated conclusions, but neither provides final answers; Some small retrospective researches with divergent methodologies and using small hospital samples give different results.
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001827:Body Height; D004651:Employment; D005060:Europe; D005260:Female; D006305:Health Status Indicators; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008017:Life Expectancy; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009017:Morbidity; D009026:Mortality; D009656:North America; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors