The impact of income on the health of Chinese residents
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Date
2016
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University of New Brunswick
Abstract
Since the implementation of China’s reform and opening up policy in 1978, and with the rapid development of China's economy, individual income has increased significantly, and personal health is becoming a growing issue. This paper, through an empirical study, estimates the impact of income on the following measures of health: Self-reported health (SRH) and Health of last four weeks. This study uses a longitudinal dataset, the China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS). Based on the Grossman (1972) health demand model, logit regression estimates and fixed effect regression estimates, both before and after controlling for different variables and treating age differently, the results indicate that individual income is positively correlated with personal health. More specifically, each 1% increase in an individual’s income for last year is associated with an increase in the odds of health as measured by self-reported health and health for the last four weeks of around 0.045%.