Zheng Hui
Department of Sociology, Duke University, United States.
Soc Sci Med. 2009 Nov;69(9):1333-42. doi: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2009.08.016. Epub 2009 Sep 6.
The effect of income inequality on health has been a contested topic among social scientists. Most previous research is based on cross-sectional comparisons rather than temporal comparisons. Using data from the General Social Survey and the U.S. Census Bureau, this study examines how rising income inequality affects individual self-rated health in the U.S. from 1972 to 2004. Data are analyzed using hierarchical generalized linear models. The findings suggest a significant association between income inequality and individual self-rated health. The dramatic increase in income inequality from 1972 to 2004 increases the odds of worse self-rated health by 9.4 percent. These findings hold for three measures of income inequality: the Gini coefficient, the Atkinson Index, and the Theil entropy index. Results also suggest that overall income inequality and gender-specific income inequality harm men's, but not women's, self-rated health. These findings also hold for the three measures of income inequality. These findings suggest that inattention to gender composition may explain apparent discrepancies across previous studies.
收入不平等对健康的影响一直是社会科学家们争论的话题。以往的大多数研究基于横断面比较而非时间序列比较。本研究利用综合社会调查和美国人口普查局的数据，考察了1972年至2004年间收入不平等加剧如何影响美国人的个人自评健康状况。使用分层广义线性模型对数据进行分析。研究结果表明，收入不平等与个人自评健康之间存在显著关联。1972年至2004年间收入不平等的急剧加剧使自评健康状况变差的几率增加了9.4%。这些发现适用于三种收入不平等衡量指标：基尼系数、阿特金森指数和泰尔熵指数。结果还表明，总体收入不平等和按性别划分的收入不平等对男性的自评健康有损害，但对女性没有。这些发现也适用于这三种收入不平等衡量指标。这些发现表明，对性别构成的忽视可能解释了以往研究中明显的差异。
