Agrrawal Pankaj, Waggle Doug, Sandweiss Daniel H
MaineBusiness School, University of Maine, Orono, Maine, United States of America.
Department of Accounting and Finance, University of West Florida, Pensacola, Florida, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2017 Nov 2;12(11):e0186913. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0186913. eCollection 2017.
Financial crises inflict significant human as well as economic hardship. This paper focuses on the human fallout of capital market stress. Financial stress-induced behavioral changes can manifest in higher suicide and murder-suicide rates. We find that these rates also correlate with the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate (negatively associated; a -0.25% drop [in the rate of change in annual suicides for a +1% change in the independent variable]), unemployment rate (positive link; 0.298% increase), inflation rate (positive link; 0.169% increase in suicide rate levels) and stock market returns adjusted for the risk-free T-Bill rate (negative link; -0.047% drop). Suicides tend to rise during periods of economic turmoil, such as the recent Great Recession of 2008. An analysis of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data of more than 2 million non-natural deaths in the US since 1980 reveals a positive correlation with unemployment levels. We find that suicides and murder-suicides associated with adverse market sentiment lag the initial stressor by up to two years, thus opening a policy window for government/public health intervention to reduce these negative outcomes. Both our models explain about 73 to 76% of the variance in suicide rates and rate of change in suicide rates, and deploy a total of four widely available independent variables (lagged and/or transformed). The results are invariant to the inclusion/exclusion of 2008 data over the 1980-2016 time series, the period of our study. The disconnect between rational decision making, induced by cognitive dissonance and severe financial stress can lead to suboptimal outcomes, not only in the area of investing, but in a direct loss of human capital. No economic system can afford such losses. Finance journal articles focus on monetary alpha, which is the return on a portfolio in excess of the benchmark; we think it is important to be aware of the loss of human capital as a consequence of market instability. This study makes one such an attempt.
金融危机给人类带来了巨大的痛苦，也造成了经济困境。本文关注资本市场压力对人类的影响。金融压力引发的行为变化可能表现为自杀率和谋杀自杀率上升。我们发现，这些比率还与国内生产总值（GDP）增长率（负相关；自变量每增加1%，年度自杀率变化率下降0.25%）、失业率（正相关；增加0.298%）、通货膨胀率（正相关；自杀率水平增加0.169%）以及经无风险国债利率调整后的股票市场回报率（负相关；下降0.047%）相关。自杀率往往在经济动荡时期上升，比如2008年最近的大衰退期间。对美国疾病控制与预防中心（CDC）自1980年以来200多万例非自然死亡数据的分析显示，自杀率与失业水平呈正相关。我们发现，与负面市场情绪相关的自杀和谋杀自杀事件比最初的压力源滞后长达两年，从而为政府/公共卫生干预以减少这些负面结果打开了政策窗口。我们的两个模型都解释了自杀率和自杀率变化率中约73%至76%的方差，并总共使用了四个广泛可用的自变量（滞后和/或变换后的）。在我们研究的1980 - 2016年时间序列中，无论是否纳入2008年的数据，结果都是不变的。由认知失调和严重金融压力引发的理性决策之间的脱节，不仅会在投资领域导致次优结果，还会直接造成人力资本的损失。没有哪个经济体系能够承受这样的损失。金融期刊文章关注货币阿尔法，即投资组合超过基准的回报率；我们认为，意识到市场不稳定导致的人力资本损失很重要。本研究就是这样一次尝试。
