The Impact of Job Stress on Smoking and Quitting: Evidence from the HRS

This paper examines the impact of job-related stress on smoking behavior. We use data from the Health and Retirement Study to examine how high job stress affects the probability that smokers quit and the number of cigarettes smoked for current smokers. We include individual fixed effects, which control for time-invariant factors. Occupational fixed effects are also included to control for occupational characteristics other than stress; time dummies control for the secular decline in smoking rates. Using a sample of people who smoked in the previous wave, we find that job stress is positively related to continuing to smoke and to the number of cigarettes smoked for current smokers. The FE results are of greater magnitude and significance than the OLS results suggesting an important omitted variable bias in OLS estimates. It may be that individuals who are able to handle stress or have better self-control are more likely to have high stress jobs and less likely to smoke. We also find that the smoking/stress relationship is neither explained by heterogeneity across individuals in cognitive ability, risk taking preferences or planning horizons nor is it explained by time varying measures that we observe.

Job Loss: Eat, Drink and Try to be Merry

Preliminary draft. Please do not quote. This paper examines the impact of job loss due to business closings on body mass index (BMI) and alcohol consumption. We suggest that the ambiguous findings in the extant literature may be due in part to unobserved heterogeneity in response and in part due to an overly broad measure of job loss that is partially endogenous (e.g. layoffs). We improve upon this literature by using: exogenously determined business closings, a sophisticated estimation approach (finite mixture models) to deal with complex heterogeneity, and national, longitudinal data from the Health and Retirement Study. For both alcohol consumption and BMI, we find evidence that individuals who are more likely to respond to job loss by increasing unhealthy behaviors are already in the problematic range for these behaviors before losing their jobs. These results suggest the health effects of job loss could be concentrated among “at risk ” individuals and could lead to negative outcomes for the individuals, their families, and society at large

Sin Taxes: Do Heterogeneous Responses Undercut Their Value?

This paper estimates the price elasticity of demand for alcohol using Health and Retirement Survey data. To account for unobserved heterogeneity in price responsiveness, we use finite mixture models. We recover two latent groups, one is significantly responsive to price but the other is unresponsive. Differences between these two groups can be explained in part by the behavioral factors of risk aversion, financial planning horizon, forward looking and locus of control. These results have policy implications. Only a subgroup responds significantly to price. Importantly, the unresponsive group drinks more heavily, suggesting that a higher price could fail to curb drinking by those most likely to cause negative externalities. In contrast, those least likely to impose costs on others are more responsive, thus suffering greater deadweight loss yet with less prevention of negative externalities.

Job Loss: Eat, drink and try to be merry?

This paper examines the impact of job loss from business closings on body mass index (BMI) and alcohol consumption. We improve upon extant literature by using: exogenously determined business closings, a sophisticated estimation approach (finite mixture models) to deal with complex heterogeneity, and national, longitudinal data (Health and Retirement Study). For both alcohol consumption and BMI, we find evidence that individuals who are more likely to respond to job loss by increasing unhealthy behaviors are already in the problematic range for these behaviors before losing their jobs. Thus health effects of job loss could be concentrated among “at risk” individuals.

Preventive Health Behaviors among the Elderly

<p>This dissertation consists of three essays that study preventive health behaviors among the elderly U.S. population.</p><p>The first essay studies the effect of Medicare coverage on demand for the influenza vaccine. I use a propensity score matching estimator to look at the effect of the 1993 Medicare part B coverage of the flu shot on demand. Using data from the Medicare Current Beneficiary survey, I find that the coverage increases demand by 12.4%. I also find that this effect varies by smoking status and by the presence chronic respiratory illnesses such as COPD, Asthma or Emphysema.</p><p>The second essay examines the effect of disease specific health shocks on risk perceptions and demand for the pneumonia vaccine. I find strong evidence of learning - individuals who experience a health shock are less likely to believe that they are not at risk of infection, conditional on prior beliefs. This change in beliefs is accompanied by a corresponding change in demand. Individuals who contract pneumonia or influenza are 60% more likely to vaccinate by the end of next year as compared to those who are not infected.</p><p>The third essay studies the relationship between education and health for a sample of elderly diabetics. We identify various mechanisms through which more education leads to improved health. We find that part of the strong positive correlation between educational attainment and health can be explained through differences in cognitive status, self-control and parental characteristics. However, some part of this relationship still remains unexplained.</p>Dissertatio

WI20-01: Nursing Home Use Expectations and Wealth Accumulation Among Older Adults

This study analyses the determinants of older adults' nursing home use expectations, their relationship with actual nursing home use in the future, and the association between nursing home use expectations and older adults' decisions regarding wealth accumulation.Long-term care represents a substantial financial risk to the elderly in the U.S., yet few elderly individuals purchase private insurance for such care. Less wealthy households may qualify for Medicaid coverage but remaining households must pay for long-term care out of their pocket. Elderly persons therefore have an incentive to either accumulate substantial wealth to pay for long-term care or spend down their wealth to qualify for Medicaid coverage. These decisions depend crucially on individual expectations about future nursing home use. Therefore, it is important to understand what affects these expectations and how they influence wealth accumulation. The proposed study will use data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) to evaluate these effects. The HRS is a longitudinal survey of older Americans with detailed information on nursing home use expectations, actual use and wealth. Specifically, we will: 1) identify factors that are associated with expectations about future nursing home use and examine whether individuals update their nursing home use expectations in response to health shocks and other changing conditions, 2) examine whether expectations about nursing home use match actual nursing home use in the future, 3) evaluate whether nursing home use expectations influence wealth accumulation among the elderly, and 4) examine whether there is any heterogeneity by wealth, gender, race, cohort and other demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. This research is expected to advance our understanding of wealth inequality and the role of public programs or policies that impact the wealth of older Americans such as Social Security and Medicaid.Center for Financial Security, Retirement and Disability Research Consortium, U.S. Social Security Administration

The Impact of Job Stress on Smoking and Quitting: Evidence from the HRS

Job-related stress might affect smoking behavior because smoking may relieve stress and stress can make individuals more present-focused. Alternatively, individuals may both self-select into stressful jobs and choose to smoke based on unobserved factors. We use data from the Health and Retirement Study to examine how job stress affects the probability that smokers quit and the number of cigarettes smoked for current smokers. To address the potential endogeneity of job stress based on time invariant factors, we include individual fixed effects, which control for factors such as ability to handle stress. Occupational fixed effects are also included to control for occupational characteristics other than stress; time dummies control for the secular decline in smoking rates. Using a sample of people who smoked in the previous wave, we find that job stress is positively related to continuing to smoke among recent smokers. The results indicate that the key impact of stress is on the extensive margin of smoking, as opposed to the number of cigarettes smoked.