title: Pro-cyclical mortality across socioeconomic groups and health status.
abstract: Using variation across geographic regions, a number of studies from the U.S. and other developed countries have found more deaths in economic upturns and less deaths in economic downturns. We use data from regions in Norway for 1977-2008 and find the same pro-cyclical patterns. Using individual-level register data for the identical population, we find that disadvantaged socioeconomic groups are not hit harder by pro-cyclical mortality than advantaged groups. We also find that other indicators of deteriorated health (than death), like becoming disabled, are pro-cyclical. Overall, our analysis suggests that pro-cyclical mortality is rather related to deaths of people already in deteriorated health than to people of low socioeconomic status.
authors.affiliation: University of Stavanger, Norway. Electronic address: venke.f.haaland@uis.no.
authors.forename: Venke Furre
authors.initials: VF
authors.lastname: Haaland
authors.affiliation: University of Stavanger, Norway; Statistics Norway, Research Department, Norway. Electronic address: tel@ssb.no.
authors.forename: Kjetil
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Telle
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D057172:Economic Recession / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009026:Mortality; D009664:Norway / Q000453:epidemiology; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D014478:Unemployment / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Business cycle; Morbidity; Mortality; Recession; Unemployment