Are There Differences in the Health- Socio-economic Status Relationship over the Life Cycle? Evidence from Germany

Most research on the relationship between health and socio-economic status (SES) controls for age or investigates the relationship for a particular age range. This paper, however, examines the effect of SES on health across different age groups. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and controlling for health-SES endogeneity, we find that the health-income relationship does vary across the life cycle and between genders and different labor force status, with the impact of income on health relatively more pronounced for younger cohorts. The unemployed also have lower levels of health at all levels of income. Copyright 2008 The Authors.