The Public Health Costs of Job Loss

Details

Serval ID
serval:BIB_DAD66D9E6C2A
Type
Article: article from journal or magazin.
Collection
Publications
Institution
Title
The Public Health Costs of Job Loss
Journal
Journal of Health Economics
Author(s)
Kuhn A., Lalive R., Zweimüller J.
ISSN
0167-6296
Publication state
Published
Issued date
12/2009
Peer-reviewed
Oui
Volume
28
Number
6
Pages
1099-1115
Language
english
Abstract
We study the short-run effect of involuntary job loss on comprehensive measures of public health costs. We focus on job loss induced by plant Closure, thereby addressing the reverse Causality problem as job displacements due to plant closure are unlikely caused by workers' health Status, but potentially have important effects on individual workers' health and associated public health costs. Our empirical analysis is based on a rich data set from Austria providing comprehensive information on various types of health care costs and day-by-day work history at the individual level. Our central findings are (i) overall expenditures on medical treatments are not strongly affected by job displacement; (ii) job loss significantly increases expenditures for antidepressants and related drugs, as well as for hospitalizations due to mental health problems for men (but not for women) although the effects are economically rather small; and (iii) sickness benefits strongly increase due to job loss.
Keywords
Social cost of unemployment, Health, Job loss, Plant closure
Web of science
Create date
08/12/2009 11:34
Last modification date
20/08/2019 16:59
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