The Relationship Between Socio-economic Status And Health

At present, the research on the relationship between Socio-Economic Status(SES) and health, the western developed countries have been in the exploration of interactive mechanism of the socio-economic status affecting health through various intermediate variables, In China, we are still in the research stage of direct relationship between socio-economic status and health, until recent years, few scholars have begun to study the lifestyle, social situation and other single species of intermediate mechanism. Relative to the research on the relationship between socio-economic status and health in foreign countries, the domestic research progress is obviously in the backward stage. Based on the present research situation, this paper focuses on the relationship between socio-economic status and health, focusing on the following two questions: first, whether there is a direct causal relationship between socio-economic status and health, second, whether the socio-economic status affect health through the intermediate mechanism of lifestyle. As one of the emerging disciplines of economics, the health related research in health economics faces limits such as the method, research data and research framework and some other aspects, the overall level of research and research depth are relatively weak, and there is still no unified standards for the concept and the measurement variables of the core content as socio-economic status and so on, the research framework of the relationship between socio-economic status and health is also very immature. Under such research background, this paper has carried out the following research on the theory and the demonstration.Theorily, on the basis of related literature review, give definitions of the related core concepts of this paper; based on the health needs and health production theory in health economics, health human capital theory, Amartya Sen’s freedom and equality theory and market failure theory, under the research framework of social causal theory to do the theoretical analysis of direct causal relationship between socio-economic status and health, and based on the research framework of health risk behaviors theory to explore the theoretical analysis of the indirect mechanism of socio-economic status affecting health by lifestyle intermediate mechanism, Empirically, using the data of China health and nutrition survey(CHNS) in 2011, making the statistical description and interaction analysis about the health indicators and corresponding relative factors, and under the Lorentz curve and concentration curve to describe the present situation of population health and health inequalities in China; Establishing the basic regression model, the squared regression model and the cubic regression model based on the Grossman health demand model, and use the method of stepwise regression, make a relative empirical test about the possible linear, u-shaped or inverted u-shaped, or s-shaped relationship between socio-economic status and health; Building a structural equation model to portray the relationship of the three variables as socio-economic status, health and lifestyle; the affecting path, the degree of influence of the three variables are analyzed, and the total effect of soco-economic status is decomposed as direct effect and indirect effect to empirically research the SES affecting health through lifestyle intermediate mechanism.After the theoretical analysis and the empirical work, the following main conclusions are made in this paper:First, for the health inequality status in our country, point out that health inequality situation does exist, whether the natural factors or the socio-economic status factors that affect health, there are health inequalities. Based on different health indicators, the situation of health inequality is different. And health inequality has the characteristics that biased to the high income and education especially high education groups.Second, about the causal relationship between socio-economic status and health, find that between socio-economic status and health there is a certain direct causality. And the causal relationship between both is different based on different health indicators. Based on the Self-Assessed Life(SAL)variable, after controlling all the natural health effecting variables, family net annual income, the highest level of education, hukou and medical insurance, the four socio-economic status indicators and health is significantly and positively correlated. People who have higher income,have the better health; People who have Higher level of education, the better their health status; Urban population health status are relatively better; People who have health insurance have better health status.There is a certain ”U”effect of income impcting health,”S” type impact did not pass the significance test. Based on the Self-Assessed Health(SAH)variable, after controlling all the natural health effecting variables, income, hukou and medical insurance, the three socio-economic status indicators and health is significantly and positively correlated. People who have higher income, have the better health; Urban population health status are relatively better; People who have health insurance have better health status. And there is a certain inverted ”U”effect of income impcting health.Third, with regard to the socio-economic status affecting health through lifestyle mechanism, the empirical results show that the socio-economic status is positively affecting lifestyle, lifestyle is positively affecting people’s health status, and the indirect impact of socio-economic status affecting health is more than 0,and the indirect effect of socio-economic status affecting health is greater than the direct effect of socio-economic status affecting health, so China’s data support the socio-economic status affecting health by the lifestyle mechanism.Fourth, under the relevant standards, health inequalities caused by socio-economic status belong to the category of health inequity, we should promote the socio-economic status related system’s fairness development and reform as income, education, medical insurance, hukou system;promote the formation of the national health lifestyle, and develop the grand health industry in order to promote health equity and high quality health equity.In general, this paper systematically discussed the relationship between socio-economic status and health, deepening the understanding of the concepts and indexes of health inequality, health inequity and so on, enriching the research frameworks of the direct relationship research between socio-economic status and health, and the intermediate mechanism of socio-economic status influencing health. There may be contributions mainly embodied in three aspects:First, expanded the research frame work.This paper expand the health demand model of Grossman to theoretically analysis the causality between socio-economic status and health; Under the theoretical framework of health risk behaviors theory to analysis the socio-economic status and health by the lifestyle mechanism; Using framework of Amartya Sen ’s theory of equality and freedom and Rawls’ s justice theory to judge the fairness of health inequalities that caused by soco-economic status.Second, put forward some targeted countermeasures to promote health high quality equity in our country. Firstly, promote health equity with related systems’ construction, including the national income distribution system fairness construction, the national education fairness development, deepen the reform of the medical insurance system and accelerate the reform of household registration system; Secondly, the related Suggestions to promote the high quality health equity, including promote the formation of the national health lifestyle and develop the grand health industry.The shortages of the paper lie in the selection of indicators whose concept are still of controversy, such as socio-economic status; In addition, the related core concepts, especially the definition of health inequality may not be comprehensive, the conclusion have not the general explanatory power for the reality. All these problems need to breakthrough in the future study.