A Suicidal Kuznets Curve?

Antonakakis, Nikolaos and Collins, Alan (2016): A Suicidal Kuznets Curve?

Abstract

In 1955 Simon Kuznets hypothesized an inverted U-shaped relationship between economic growth and income inequality. Environmental and obesity variants substitute pollution and body mass metrics for income inequality. Graphical depictions of both feature widely in economic literature. In this study, we investigate the existence (or lack thereof) of a suicidal Kuznets curve. Controlling for several country-specific socioeconomic suicide determinants among 73 countries over the period 1990-2010, we find evidence of an N-shaped suicidal Kuznets curve between per capita income and suicide rates of the male population of 25-34, 34-54 and 55-74 age groups and the female population of the 55-74 age group. The turning points of per capita income for the male population of 25-34, 34-54 and 55-74 age groups are $7,727 and $46,306, $5,266 and $22,726, and $3,459 and $53,260, respectively, while for the female population of the 55-74 age groups are $4,022 and $43,351. On average and across both genders, as per capita income increases, suicide rates for those aged 25-34 and 35-54 follow an increasing trend and peak when per capita income reaches $7,304 and $6,498, respectively, then follow a declining trend until $60,819 and $25,129, respectively, and increase thereafter again. These results remain robust to a battery of robustness checks.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: Suicide, GDP growth, Kuznets curve, Unemployment, Fertility, Life expectancy
• Subjects: C - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods > C3 - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models ; Multiple Variables > C33 - Panel Data Models ; Spatio-temporal Models; E - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics > E3 - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles > E32 - Business Fluctuations ; Cycles; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I1 - Health > I15 - Health and Economic Development; I - Health, Education, and Welfare > I3 - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty > I31 - General Welfare, Well-Being; J - Labor and Demographic Economics > J1 - Demographic Economics > J13 - Fertility ; Family Planning ; Child Care ; Children ; Youth

References

Akee, R. K. Q., Simeonova, E., Copeland, W., Angold, A., Costello, J. E., 2010. Does More Money Make You Fat? The Effects of Quasi-Experimental Income Transfers on Adolescent and Young Adult Obesity. IZA Discussion Papers 5135, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA).

Altinanahtar, A., Halicioglu, F., 2009. A Dynamic Econometric Model of Suicides in Turkey. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics 38 (6), 903-907.

Andres, A. R., 2005. Income Inequality, Unemployment, and Suicide: A Panel Data Analysis of 15 European Countries. Applied Economics 37 (4), 439-451.

Andres, A. R., Halicioglu, F., 2010. Determinants of Suicides in Denmark: Evidence from Time Series Data. Health Policy 98 (2-3), 263-269.

Andres, A. R., Halicioglu, F., Yamamura, E., 2011. Socio-economic Determinants of Suicide in Japan. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics 40 (6), 723-731.

Antonakakis, N., Collins, A., 2014. The Impact of Fiscal Austerity on Suicide: On the Empirics of a Modern Greek Tragedy. Social Science & Medicine 112, 39-50.

Antonakakis, N., Collins, A., 2015. The Impact of Fiscal Austerity on Suicide Mortality: Evidence Across the Eurozone 'Periphery'. Social Science & Medicine 145, 63-78.

Arellano, M., Bover, O., 1995. Another Look at the Instrumental Variable Estimation of Error- Components Models. Journal of Econometrics 68 (1), 29-51.

Blundell, R., Bond, S., 1998. Initial Conditions and Moment Restrictions in Dynamic Panel Data Models. Journal of Econometrics 87 (1), 115-143.

Bond, S. R., 2002. Dynamic Panel Data Models: A Guide to Micro Data Methods and Practice. Portuguese Economic Journal 1 (2), 141-162.

Brainerd, E., 2001. Economic Reform and Mortality in the Former Soviet Union: A Study of the Suicide Epidemic in the 1990s. European Economic Review 45 (4{6), 1007-1019.

Chen, J., Choi, Y. J., Mori, K., Sawada, Y., Sugano, S., 2012. Socio-Economic Studies On Suicide: A Survey. Journal of Economic Surveys 26 (2), 271-306.

Chen, Y.-Y., Yip, P. S., Lee, C., Fan, H.-F., Fu, K.-W., 2010. Economic Fluctuations and Suicide: A Comparison of Taiwan and Hong Kong. Social Science & Medicine 71 (12), 2083-2090.

Chuang, H.-L., Huang, W.-C., 1997. Economic and Social Correlates of Regional Suicide Rates: A Pooled Cross-section and Time-series Analysis. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics 26 (3), 277-289.

Chuang, H.-L., Huang, W.-C., 2007. A Re-Examination of the Suicide Rates in Taiwan. Social Indicators Research 83 (3), 465-485.

Cuellar, A. E., Markowitz, S., 2007. Medicaid Policy Changes in Mental Health Care and their Effect on Mental Health Outcomes. Health Economics, Policy and Law 2 (01), 23-49.

Dinda, S., 2004. Environmental Kuznets Curve Hypothesis: A Survey. Ecological Economics 49 (4), 431-455.

Duesenberry, J. S., 1949. Income, Saving and the Theory of Consumer Behaviour. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Durkheim, E., 1897. Le Suicide: Etude de Sociologie. Alcan, Paris. (Spaulding, J.A., Simpson, G (Trans.), 1951. Suicide: A Study of Sociology). Free Press, New York.

Ginsberg, R. B., 1966. Anomie and aspiration. Dissertation Abstracts 27A, 3945-3946.

Grecu, A. M., Rotthoff, K. W., 2015. Economic Growth and Obesity: Findings of an Obesity Kuznets Curve. Applied Economics Letters 22 (7), 539-543.

Hamermesh, D. S., Soss, N. M., 1974. An Economic Theory of Suicide. Journal of Political Economy 82 (1), 83-98.

Henry, A. F., Short, J. F., 1954. Suicide and Homicide. Free Press, New York.

Huijts, T., Reeves, A., McKee, M., Stuckler, D., 2015. The Impacts of Job Loss and Job Recovery on Self-rated Health: Testing the Mediating Role of Financial Strain and Income. The European Journal of Public Health 25 (5), 801-806.

Jungeilges, J., Kirchgassner, G., 2002. Economic Welfare, Civil Liberty, and Suicide: An Empirical Investigation. Journal of Socio-Economics 31 (3), 215-231.

Koo, J., Cox, W. M., 2008. An Economic Interpretation Of Suicide Cycles In Japan. Contemporary Economic Policy 26 (1), 162-174.

Kposowa, A. J., 2003. Research on Unemployment and Suicide. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 57 (8), 559-560.

Kunce, M., Anderson, A. L., 2002. The Impact of Socioeconomic Factors on State Suicide Rates: A Methodological Note. Urban Studies 39 (1), 155-162.

Kuroki, M., 2010. Suicide and Unemployment in Japan: Evidence from Municipal Level Suicide Rates and Age-specific Suicide Rates. Journal of Socio-Economics 39 (6), 683-691.

Kuznets, S., 1955. Economic Growth and Income Inequality. American Economic Review 45, 1-28.

Lester, D., 1996. Patterns of Suicide and Homicide in the World. Nova Science Publishers, New York.

Minoiu, C., Andres, A. R., 2008. The Effect of Public Spending on Suicide: Evidence from U.S. State Data. Journal of Socio{Economics 37 (1), 237-261.

Nahman, A., Antrobus, G., 2005. The Environmental Kuznets Curve: A Literature Survey. South African Journal of Economics 73 (1), 105-120.

Neumayer, E., 2003a. Are Socioeconomic Factors Valid Determinants of Suicide? Controlling for National Cultures of Suicide with Fixed-Effects Estimation. Cross-Cultural Research 37 (3), 307-329.

Neumayer, E., 2003b. Socioeconomic Factors and Suicide Rates at Large-unit Aggregate Levels: A Comment. Urban Studies 40 (13), 2769-2776.

Nickell, S. J., 1981. Biases in Dynamic Models with Fixed Effects. Econometrica 49 (6), 1417-1426.

Okada, K., Samreth, S., 2013. A study on the Socio-economic Determinants of Suicide: Evidence from 13 European OECD Countries. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics 45 (C), 78-85.

Preti, A., 2003. Unemployment and Suicide. Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 57 (8), 557-558.

Qin, P., 2005. Suicide Risk in Relation to Level of Urbanicity A Population-based Linkage Study. International Journal of Epidemiology 34 (4), 846-852.

Qin, P., Agerbo, E., Mortensen, P., 2010. Suicide Risk in Relation to Socioeconomic, Demographic, Psychiatric, and Familial Factors: A National Register Based Study of all Suicides in Denmark. American Journal of Psychiatry 160, 765-772.

Roodman, D., 2009. How to Do xtabond2: An Introduction to Difference and System GMM in Stata. Stata Journal 9 (1), 86-136.

Ruhm, C. J., 2000. Are Recessions Good for Your Health? The Quarterly Journal of Economics 115 (2), 617-650.

Stern, D. I., 2004. The Rise and Fall of the Environmental Kuznets Curve. World Development 32 (8), 1419-1439.

Unnithan, N. P., Huff-Corzine, L., Corzine, J., Whitt, H. P., 1994. The Currents of Lethal Violence: An Integrated Model of Suicide and Homicide). State University of New York Press, Albany.

Viren, M., 1999. Testing the \Natural Rate of Suicide" Hypothesis. International Journal of Social Economics 26 (12), 1428-1440.

Viren, M., 2005. Suicide and Business Cycles: New Empirical Evidence. Applied Economics Letters 12 (14), 887-891.

WHO, 2015. Suicide: Fact Sheet Number 398, World Health Organization. URL http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs398/en/

Windmeijer, F., 2005. A Finite Sample Correction for the Variance of Linear Effcient Two-step GMM Estimators. Journal of Econometrics 126 (1), 25-51.

Yamamura, E., 2010. The Different Impacts of Socio-economic Factors on Suicide between Males and Females. Applied Economics Letters 17 (10), 1009-1012.