Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics

Research Papers in Economics,
Stockholm University, Department of Economics

No 2007:4: Parental Income, Lifetime Income and Mortality

Mårten Palme () and Sofia Sandgren ()
Additional contact information
Mårten Palme: Dept. of Economics, Stockholm University, Postal: Department of Economics, Stockholm University, S-106 91 Stockholm, Sweden
Sofia Sandgren: Department of Economics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Postal: Department of Economics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, 7491 Trondheim, Norway

Abstract: This paper studies the relation between parental economic resources and mortality later in life. We use a data set on a cohort of individuals born in 1928 in the county of Malmö in southern Sweden, which contains exceptionally detailed measures of parental household income from five years during the indivduals' childhood between 1929 and 1942. The data also contain very rich information on individual earnings throughout these individuals' entire life cycle that allows us to construct a measure of lifetime earnings. Date and cause of death are obtained from national registers. Using Cox proportional hazard models, we find an inverse relationship between parental indome and mortality, also when controling for indivdual lifetime income and when studying those with high education separately. A competing risk analysis shows the relation between parental income and mortality to apply to cancer as the cause of death.

Keywords: Health; Life Expectancy; Longevity; Cause of Death; Cox Proportional Hazard Models

JEL-codes: D31; I10; I12; J10

34 pages, May 10, 2007

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