Parental income gradients in child and adolescent mortality: Norwegian trends over half a century

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Parental income and mental disorders in children and adolescents:prospective register-based study

Background Children with low-income parents have a higher risk of mental disorders, although it is unclear whether other parental characteristics or genetic confounding explain these associations and whether it is true for all mental disorders. Methods In this registry-based study of all children in Norway (n = 1 354 393) aged 5–17 years from 2008 to 2016, we examined whether parental income was associated with childhood diagnoses of mental disorders identified through national registries from primary healthcare, hospitalizations and specialist outpatient services. Results There were substantial differences in mental disorders by parental income, except for eating disorders in girls. In the bottom 1% of parental income, 16.9% [95% confidence interval (CI): 15.6, 18.3] of boys had a mental disorder compared with 4.1% (95% CI: 3.3, 4.8) in the top 1%. Among girls, there were 14.2% (95% CI: 12.9, 15.5) in the lowest, compared with 3.2% (95% CI: 2.5, 3.9) in the highest parental-income percentile. Differences were mainly attributable to attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder in boys and anxiety and depression in girls. There were more mental disorders in children whose parents had mental disorders or low education, or lived in separate households. Still, parental income remained associated with children’s mental disorders after accounting for parents’ mental disorders and other factors, and associations were also present among adopted children. Conclusions Mental disorders were 3- to 4-fold more prevalent in children with parents in the lowest compared with the highest income percentiles. Parents’ own mental disorders, other socio-demographic factors and genetic confounding did not fully explain these associations

The family gap in pay : evidence from Norway

I will in this thesis examine the family gap in pay (i.e. differences in hourly pay between mothers and non-mothers) among Norwegian women. While women in general make up a substantial part of the workforce today, a large literature shows that women with children have lower hourly earnings than women without children even with same type of education and experience. Evidence of a family gap in pay has been found for the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and also for Norway. Conventionally, five explanations have been given to explain the lower wages of mothers. (1) Mothers may earn less because they lose experience that are relevant for their work effort, (2) they may be less productive at work due to childrearing,(3)they may choose jobs more compatible with childrearing but at the expense of higher wages, (4) employers might discriminate against mothers, (5)or it could be that non-mothers differ from mothers in ways that are relevant for wages and careers. However, which of these explanations to put most emphasis on is still an unresolved matter in the literature of the family gap. The available data was obtained from Statistics Norway and the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise (NHO). It covers the private business sector in Norway for the years 1980-1997. The data contains information about wages, establishments, occupation, age, education, family status, number of children (including when they were born) and more. The feature of the data (matched employer –employee data) allows me scrutinize the causes of the family gap in ways that have not been done before. One important aspect concerns that of employer discrimination. With the available data I can see if mothers are being paid less than non-mothers once they perform the same work for the same employer. Another central aspect concerns the time-frame of the data. A presumption in the exciting literature of the family gap is that the lower wages for women with children can be explained by the lack of well-developed family policies in such countries. The data I have available covers the years 1980-1997, a period with significant expansion in family policies in Norway. This allows me to see if the penalties to motherhood have changed over time, and to see if the family policies implemented in this years have had any of the intended effects. I will use Ordinary Least Square Models (OLS) to examine the family gap in Norway with the natural log for wage as the dependent variable. In my analyses I will use different specifications of the OLS model, which will take into account the different levels of the data which arises with matched employer-employee data. The main finding from my analysis is that is has occurred a great change in the situation for mothers in the private sector. The critical disparities in wages between mothers and non-mothers evident in the earliest years are severely reduced by the end of study. However, mothers still earn on average less than non-mothers, and these differences also increase with how many children you have. The main explanation for this is that mothers are sorted on different occupations and different establishment where lower wages prevails compared to non-mothers. Another important finding is when mothers and non-mothers actually work for the same employer and in same establishment, they receive same pay. As such within-job-wage discrimination is not what constitutes the family gap in pay in Norway. Whether this differential sorting is due to some compensating differentials i.e. mothers seek this positions because they are more easily combined with childrearing but at the expense of lower wages, or if it is a result of employer discrimination is difficult to determine. One could imagine that employers in the hiring situation channel mothers in to lower paid occupations, or give mothers less promotions compared to non-mothers. But also mothers may choose to spend less time at work and /or give less effort at work when they have children. In order to settle such a discussion more research on how family life and work life intersect is needed

Arbeidsledighet og psykisk helse blant unge i Norden : En kunnskapsoversikt

I denne rapporten presenteres resultatene fra en litteraturgjenomgang hvor formålet var å gjenomgå nordiske studier på forholdet mellom arbeidsledighet og psykisk helse blant unge voksne i alderen 15-29 år. Den omfatter studier som er publisert i perioden 1995 og frem til i dag. Generelt er arbeidsledighet forbundet med en økt risiko for nedsatt psykisk helse. Dette viser også to studier som har kontrollert for henholdsvispsykisk helseforut for ledighet og tidsinvariante egenskaper ved individene. Litteraturgjennomgangen indikerer at kvinner ermer negativt påvirket av arbeidsledighet enn menn, og at unge voksne kan væremer negativt påvirket enn eldre. Økonomiske problemer og sosial integreringser ut til åvære viktige faktorer med hensyn til om de unge arbeidsledige får nedsatt psykisk helseeller ikke. Overgang tilarbeidsmarkedstiltak, utdanning eller jobb er forbundet med en reduksjon i psykiske helseplager. I tillegg viser det seg at unge i arbeid eller utdanning oftere har psykiske helseplager i økonomiske nedgangstider enn i økonomiske oppgangstider. Ingen studier har sett spesielt på utsatte grupper som unge med innvandrerbakgrunn og unge med helseproblemer. Resultatene fra denne litteraturoppsummeringen bør tas medflere forbehold. For det første, hovedtyngden av studiene er svenske og basert på små og lokale utvalg. For det andre, de fleste studiene anvender data som ti år gamle eller eldre. Dessutenhar kun et mindretall av studiene anvendt mer statistisk avanserte teknikker for å ta høyde for revers kausalitet og seleksjon. Det er derfor behov for studier basert på store utvalg som benytter seg av mer avanserte statistiske metoder. Det trengs ogsåstudier som undersøker sammenhengen mellom arbeidsledighet og psykisk helse blant utsatte unge, og en mer grundig og systematisk evaluering av ulike arbeidsmarkedstiltak.På tross av de ulike forbeholdene tyder forskningen på at en fortsattinnsats i utdannings- og arbeidsmarkedspolitikken rettet inn mot å kvalifisere unge for arbeidsmarkedet er viktig i et psykisk helseperspektiv. Videre er det viktig å implementere arbeidsmarkedstiltak på en måte som muligbjør en senare evaluering og som også inkluderer psykisk helse som et av målekriteriene.This reprot presents a review of Nordic research literature on the relationship between unemployment and mental health among adults aged 15-29 years. It includes published studies conducted between1995 and2011. Overall unemploymentis associated with poorer mental health than being employed.This association is evident even in two studies which respectively take into account mental health prior to unemployment and time invariant characteristics of the individual.Further, the review suggests that young women are more affected by unemploymentthan young men, and that young adults are more affected than older adults. Economic problems and the level of social integration are important factors in explaining why some unemployed experience poorer mental healthyetothers do not.Transition into labour market programs, education or employment is associated with improved mental health. The mental healthof young adults in employment and education is poorer during periods of economic recession than during periods of economic growth. We found no studies examiningthe link between unemployment and mental healthamong especially vulnerable groups such as young adults with immigrant background or those with mental or physical health problems. The studies included in this reviewof Nordic literaturehave several shortcomings. First, a majority of the studies are Swedish and based on small and local samples.Secondly, most studies are more than ten years old. Thirdly, only a minority of the studies have made use of more statistically advanced techniques to address inverse causality and selection. Thus, we recommend more research into large scale studies that can employmore statistically advanced methods. Further, knowledge of vulnerable groups and more extensive knowledge of the effect of various labour market policies are needed. Despite the shortcomings presented, we are still able to make some recommendations to those in charge of labour market and health policies. First, a continued effort into education and labour market policies, in order to qualify young adults for the labour market, is also important in a mental health perspective. Secondly, labour market policiesshould be implementedin a way that ensures that their effects can be evaluated and to include mental health measures as one element of the evaluation

Studier av velferd og livskvalitet hos barn

The welfare and wellbeing of children and youth is subject to political as well as scholarly attention. In this report, we present the most central quantitative contributions, both national and international ones, to the field. We also present measures used to map welfare and wellbeing in the lives of children. This summary of the field is part of NOVA’s work with municipal youth-surveys, as these surveys are being expanded to include younger respondents. Until now, those surveyed have been between the ages of 13-19. In the future, the age span will include 10-12 year olds. We know far less of this younger group than we do of those that are older, and this report serves as a backdrop for the work of NOVA in regard to this age group. The age span 10-12 years is marked by change, both in the social organizing of which the children are part as well as developmentally. The social space of the children expand, they increasingly orient themselves towards their peers and embark on personal identity formation. Developmentally, children go through cognitive as well as biological changes. While so-called objective measures capture some aspects of these changes, subjective measures are necessary to grasp the experiences and perspectives of the children themselves. Until recently, studies investigating the welfare and wellbeing of children in this age group have relied upon objective measures. Objective measures have been used widely, both nationally and internationally. Examples of such measures are vaccination rate or infant mortality. Parents or caregivers have also been sources of information about the welfare and wellbeing of children. However, subjective measures are used increasingly and children themselves are invited to participate. This change is due to more emphasis being put upon the right of children to voice their opinion, as well as welfare and wellbeing in the present - rather than e.g. as predictors of future wellbeing – receiving more attention. These studies stem from a long tradition of mapping welfare in populations, with the intent of promoting health and measure societal development along multiple dimensions. Welfare studies have a long tradition in Norway, but studies aimed directly at youth are more recent – from the 90ies and forward, and mostly with youths rather than children as participants. Even though many studies have used objective measures, some have been conducted in which children participated and subjective measures were used – national as well as international studies. Wellbeing is operationalized differrently across studies, but most definitions include material, physical, cognitive as well as emotional dimensions. Wellbeing is also being measured in different domains, such as school, parents, friends, etc. In this report, we describe some frequently measured domains, in which both objective and subjective measures are being used. These measures are e.g. health, resources, education and relations to others. Findings from studies using subjective measures demonstrate that children in very different countries still evaluate their lives and themselves similarly. For instance, most children report good life quality, and to be satisfied at home and at school. Some gender differences persist across countries, for instance are girls more often dissatisfied with how they look and more often than boys report of health problems. Another finding is that wellbeing vary among children with different socio-economic backgrounds, and that younger children more often than older children report of being bullied. A cause for concern is the raise – especially among girls – in reports of mental health problems. The most important contribution of this report is its account of the differences in understandings of wellbeing among children, and objective measures versus subjective measures. We demonstrate the value of using subjective measures and inviting children as participants, and a multi-dimensional understanding of wellbeing. To collect data on the experiences, feelings and viewpoints of children is important in order to know more about their wellbeing in the present, to inform and evaluate policies aimed at improving their living conditions as well as for providing valuable material for expanding the body of childhood research

Studier av velferd og livskvalitet hos barn

Studier av velferd og livskvalitet hos barn har en relativ kort historie. Studier som undersøker livskvalitet og velferd har dels sitt utspring i en helsefremmende tradisjon og dels i en samfunnsviten-skapelig tradisjon, der målet har vært å måle samfunnsutvikling langs flere dimensjoner. Barns velferd og livskvalitet har vært målt lenge, men hovedsakelig ved såkalte objektive mål. Samtidig med at barns rett til å ytre sin mening har blitt tillagt større vekt, har det blitt et økt fokus på velferd i barneårene. Resultatet av disse endringene er en fremvekst av studier som benytter subjektive mål, der barn selv deltar. Funn fra slike studier viser at barns livskvalitet generelt er god, men at det også blant barn er økt rapportering av psykiske plager

Uptake of Attendance Benefit for Children with a Disability in Norway: Impact of Socioeconomic Status and Immigrant Background

In this study, we examine the take-up of a non-mean tested cash benefit for children with a disability in Norway. We question if the uptake of the attendance benefit varies according to socioeconomic status and immigrant background using administrative register data. The sample in the present study contains all children (N = 335,415) born in the period between 2000 and 2005 in Norway, as well as their mothers. As we do not have sufficient information on the eligibility criteria for the attendance benefit of all children in the sample, we also operate with a subsample of children born with Down syndrome (n = 482), who all met the eligibility criteria. The analyses of attendance benefit uptake are performed using logistic regression analysis. We present the results both on the relative and absolute scales (odds ratios and average marginal effects). The findings show that immigrants have a lower take-up of the attendance benefit for children with a disability compared with the majority of the population. Having low earnings increases the probability of taking up the attendance benefit. Finally, the findings reveal that amongst those who already receive the attendance benefit for their child, there was no social inequality in the rate granted