Impact of Economic Crises on Mortality: The Case of Mexico (original) (raw)

Macroeconomic changes and mortality in Mexico

Empirical Economics, 2010

While previous studies examine how the business cycle affects mortality in developed countries, less is known about this relationship in developing countries. In this paper, we investigate whether the procyclical nature of mortality in developed countries found by Ruhm (2000) and others is also present in Mexico. We assemble a unique panel data set that contains state-level data on mortality rates by age and cause of death, GDP per capita, and socioeconomic status. We find that for Mexico total mortality rates are procyclical, with the largest impact on those aged 20 to 49. While these findings are similar to those in Ruhm (2000), the effects of business cycles on mortality rates differ for several specific causes of death. These results suggest that whereas total mortality may be procyclical in some developed and developing countries, significant differences may exist for some causes of death.

Financial crisis, health outcomes and ageing: Mexico in the 1980s and 1990s

Journal of Public Economics, 2002

We study the impact of economic crisis on health in Mexico. There have been four wide-scale economic crises in Mexico in the past two decades, the most recent in 1995-96. We find that mortality rates for the very young and the elderly increase or decline less rapidly in crisis years as compared with non-crisis years. In the 1995-96 crisis, mortality rates were about 5 to 7 percent higher in the crisis years compared to the years just prior to the crisis. This translates into a 0.4 percent increase in mortality for the elderly and a 0.06 percent increase in mortality for the very young. We find tentative evidence that economic crises affect mortality by reducing incomes and possibly by placing a greater burden on the medical sector, but not by forcing less healthy members of the population to work or by forcing primary caregivers to go to work.

Economic Crisis and Amenable Mortality in Spain

International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health

Background: Both overall mortality and avoidable mortality have decreased in recent years in most European countries. It has become clear that less privileged socioeconomic groups have an increased risk of death. In 2008, most countries went into a severe economic recession, whose effects on the health of the population are still ongoing. While on the one hand, some evidence associates the economic crisis with positive health outcomes (pro-cyclical effect), on the other hand, some other evidence suggests that the economic crisis may pose serious public health problems (counter-cyclical effect), which has given rise to controversy. Objectives: To describe the evolution of overall mortality and amenable mortality in Spain between 2002–2007 (before the economic crisis) and 2008–2013 (during the economic crisis), nationally and by province, as well as to analyse trends in the risks of death and their association with indicators of the impact of the crisis. Methods: Ecological study of o...

Global downturn and health. pp55 - 58

Highlighting experiences from past recessions and research, this paper examines the different effects financial crises can have on health and discusses potential local government responses.

The Long-Run Relationship among Health and Income in Mexico, 1940-2011

Journal of Reviews on Global Economics, 2016

Theoretically, it has been argued the existence of not only a strong positive correlation among health and real per capita income, but also that their variations are highly interconnected. The stationarity among health indicators and income is analyzed for Mexico, allowing for the presence of multiple structural breaks along 1940-2011, with the aim to study its long-run relationship and how the reductions of the public expenditure have affected this link. One novelty is the long-run perspective supported on structural breaks that affect both the level and the slope of the time series. After the serial correlation is accounted for, several stationary processes evolving around a broken trend are found. The estimated breakpoints are widely related to events as crises and health system reforms, while the corresponding regimes changes lead to a stage of minor health expenditure. This last can be of concern to government and society if improvements on health and economic development are desired.

Health and economic crises and the Mexican agricultural sector

Health and economic crises and the Mexican agricultural sector, 2023

Objective: To determine if the 1994 and 2008 economic crises and the 2009 and 2020 health crises had an impact on the relationship between the price and the production of the main agricultural products in the main producer states of the Mexican agricultural sector. Design/Methodology/Approach: Seventy structural stability tests with dichotomous variables were carried out in order to analyze the effect of these crises on the price-quantity relationship in the main producer states of the five regions in which the Mexican agricultural sector is divided. These states are the main producers of corn, sorghum, and bean grains in Mexico. Results: There were some exceptions but, overall, neither the 1994 and 2008 economic crises, nor the 2009 and 2020 health crises had an impact on the price-production relationship of main products of the main producer states of the five regions of the Mexican agricultural sector. Study Limitations/Implications: We did not evaluate all the products or all the Mexican states. Findings/Conclusions: Overall, economic and health crises did not impact the price-production relationship of the analyzed producer states. The price-production relationship of these states is resilient to economic and health crises-i.e., producers did not significatively alter their production as a consequence of the price changes brought about by the economic and health crises.