More educated people live longer, perceive themselves as healthier and also behave more health-conscious by, for instance, smoking less frequently. But it is far from settled, whether this correlation reflects a causal effect of education. If this was the case, a targeted educational policy could improve public health while reaping the other numerous beneficial effects of education.
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People with high income are healthier than the average of the population. However, the underlying reasons are not entirely clear. Does the cause of this inequality possibly even lie in childhood? In order to answer this question, MEA scientists analyze the influence of parental income on the health of children.
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[Translate to Englisch:] Wer erwartet, bald zu sterben, wird weniger in seine Gesundheit investieren. Diese Hypothese basiert auf der Annahme, dass Menschen in ihren Wahlmöglichkeiten über Rauchen, Trinken und Ernährung die gegenwärtigen und zukünftigen Kosten und Nutzen ihrer Wahlmöglichkeiten gegeneinander abwägen. Der zweite Nachtisch in der Mensa oder auch die nächste Zigarette verschaffen augenblicklichen Genuss, können sich jedoch auf die spätere Gesundheit negativ auswirken. Wer jedoch aus anderen Gründen ohnehin erwartet, nicht alt zu werden, hat weniger Anlass, auf die zukünftige Gesundheit Rücksicht zu nehmen.
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The more people earn, the longer they are likely to live. The relationship between income and health has been established for some time internationally and has now been confirmed empirically for pensioners in Germany in a MEA study. The research by Hans-Martin von Gaudecker from MEA and Rembrandt Scholz from the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research involved analysing a broad swathe of data on several million pensioners. Owing to the lack of suitable data comparatively few studies have been carried out on this subject in Germany.
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