title: An Analysis of Sibling Correlations in Health using Latent Variable Models.
abstract: We investigate sibling correlations in youth health status using the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. We do so by estimating the covariance structure of a system of equations in latent variables using methods that have hitherto not been used in the literature on intergenerational transmissions of health. Across a battery of outcomes, we find that between 50 and 60% of health status can be attributed to shared familial or neighborhood characteristics. Taking the principal component across all outcomes, we obtain a sibling correlation of about 53%. These estimates, which are larger than previous estimates of sibling correlations in health that rely on linear models, are more in-line with sibling correlations in income and suggest that health status, like other measures of socioeconomic success, is strongly influenced by family background. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
authors.affiliation: Department of Economics, University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization, Manoa, Honolulu, HI, USA.|IZA, Bonn, Germany.
authors.forename: Timothy J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Halliday
authors.affiliation: Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA.|University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway.
authors.forename: Bhashkar
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Mazumder
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D016901:Intergenerational Relations; D015233:Models, Statistical; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D035781:Siblings / Q000523:psychology*; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors
keywords: health; intergenerational mobility; latent variable; sibling correlations