Career Trajectory and Health in Mid-Adulthood

Han Liu, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)
Feinuo Sun , University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)

One of the gaps of extant literature on the effects of socioeconomic status (SES) on health outcomes is overlooking the effect of the dynamics in SES as well as its gender difference. Using the fixed effects model, this paper examines the effect of the change in annual net family income on the possibility of obesity, which is independent of the effect of annual net family income per se. Results based on the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY 79) shows that in general, the risk of obesity will be enhanced by higher net family income, but that risk is lower for those whose net family income increases faster. However, the effects of the net family income per se and the change in net family income are only significant, at least at 0.1 level, for females. The findings highlight the significance of SES change in health stratification research.

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 Presented in Session 11. Health & Mortality 2