Human capital, health and longevity: explaining the health gradient

人力资本、健康与长寿：解释健康梯度

• 批准号: 8352195
• 负责人: Titus Johannes Galama
• 金额: $ 9.48万
• 依托单位: RAND CORPORATION
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2012-09-30 至 2013-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/8352195
• 关键词: Address; Adopted; Aging; Attention; Award; Behavior; Behavioral Model; Behavioral Research; Behavioral Sciences; Buffaloes; Businesses; California; Capital; Chicago; Collaborations; Data Analyses; Doctor of Philosophy; Drug Formulations; Economics; Education; Educational Background; Effectiveness; Empirical Research; Employee Strikes; Ensure; Epidemiology; Equation; Foundations; Funding; Genetic; Growth; Health; Health education; Human; Independent Scientist Award; Individual; Inservice Training; Institution; Investments; Joints; Knowledge; Life Cycle Stages; Light; Literature; London; Longevity; Los Angeles; Medical Sociology; Methods; Neurobiology; Outcome; Pharmacology; Physics; Plant Roots; Policies; Policy Maker; Population; Psychology; Public Policy; Relative (related person); Research; Research Personnel; Research Project Grants; Resources; Role; Schools; Social Sciences; Societies; Socioeconomic Status; Techniques; Testing; Theoretical model; Time; Training; Universities; Work; career; career development; health disparity; human capital; model development; programs; skills; success; theories

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): One of the most striking and well-established findings in the social sciences is the very strong association between education and health. The substantial disparities in health between educational groups have attracted the attention of policymakers and reducing them is a key policy objective. Yet, surprisingly, very little is understood about this strong association, and despite previous policy efforts health disparities are increasing. In part, progress in understanding and reducing disparities has been hampered by the absence of a theoretical framework, that combines both human capital (e.g., education, [on-the-job] training) and health capital (health and longevity), to guide analyses, interpret results and derive new predictions. I have recently laid the foundation for such a theory by addressing a number of serious limitations that have long been identified with the health capital literature. I am an (award-winning, highly-cited) astrophysicist who has recently made a significant career change to the behavioral sciences. I recently completed a second PhD, this time in economics (June 2011) in which I developed a theory of disparities in health and longevity between socioeconomic status groups. As a fairly new entrant into economics, I have two immediate career objectives. First, I want to establish credibility as an economist by using the window of opportunity provided by the recent advances I made to develop a number of important life cycle theories (also Aim 1). Second, I want to strengthen the career transition to behavioral research, by further honing my skills in data analysis and econometric techniques by empirically testing my theories in collaboration with distinguished experts in relevant fields and methods (also Aim 2). My long-term career objectives are to build a research group and to establish a RAND center in human capital, health and aging (also Aim 3). The K02 mechanism would provide protected time for the proposed research agenda to achieve these immediate- and long-term career objectives. The proposed research can substantially enrich our understanding of the strong relationship between education and health, the role of institutions in encouraging investments in human capital and health, and open new avenues to addressing the observed significant disparities in health between educational groups. To ensure the success of the proposed work, I will be supported by a diverse group of renowned scholars. While their work is rooted in economics and epidemiology it draws on a variety of fields, including neurobiology, genetics, pharmacology, medicine, sociology and psychology. Further, I have the support of RAND's Labor and Population unit and access not only to the wide array of RAND's resources but also to those of my collaborators at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of Chicago, the London School of Economics, Erasmus University and SUNY at Buffalo (UB). My business and management skills, in combination with my ability to conduct high level research, ideally suit me to building a research group and setting up and directing a RAND center with a focus on human capital, health and aging research. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: One of the most striking and well-established findings in the social sciences is the very strong association between education and health, yet, very little is understood about the mechanisms underlying such health disparities. This project sheds light on this relation by further developing an economic theory of education and health, testing its predictions using structural- and reduced-form econometric techniques and employing the behavioral model to assess the relative effectiveness of alternative institutions / policies in creating healthy, wealthy and skilled societies.

描述（由申请人提供）：社会科学中最引人注目和最公认的发现之一是教育与健康之间的密切联系。教育群体之间健康状况的巨大差异引起了决策者的关注，减少这种差异是一个关键的政策目标。然而，令人惊讶的是，人们对这种紧密联系知之甚少，尽管之前做出了政策努力，但健康差距仍在扩大。在某种程度上，由于缺乏将人力资本（例如教育、[在职]培训）和健康资本（健康和长寿）结合起来的理论框架的缺乏来指导人们在理解和减少差距方面取得进展，分析、解释结果并得出新的预测。 我最近通过解决健康资本文献中长期以来发现的一些严重局限性，为这样的理论奠定了基础。我是一位（屡获殊荣、被高度引用的）天体物理学家，最近在行为科学领域做出了重大的职业转变。我最近完成了第二个博士学位，这次是经济学博士学位（2011 年 6 月），其中我发展了社会经济地位群体之间健康和寿命差异的理论。作为经济学领域的新人，我有两个近期的职业目标。首先，我想利用我最近取得的进展所提供的机会之窗来发展一些重要的生命周期理论（也是目标 1），从而建立作为经济学家的信誉。其次，我想通过与相关领域和方法的杰出专家合作，通过实证检验我的理论，进一步磨练我在数据分析和计量经济学技术方面的技能，从而加强向行为研究的职业过渡（也是目标2）。我的长期职业目标是建立一个研究小组并建立一个兰德公司人力资本、健康和老龄化中心（也是目标 3）。 K02 机制将为拟议的研究议程提供受保护的时间，以实现这些近期和长期职业目标。 拟议的研究可以极大地丰富我们对教育与健康之间的密切关系、机构在鼓励人力资本和健康投资方面的作用的理解，并为解决教育群体之间观察到的健康方面的显着差异开辟新途径。 为了确保拟议工作的成功，我将得到众多知名学者的支持。虽然他们的工作植根于经济学和流行病学，但也涉及多个领域，包括神经生物学、遗传学、药理学、医学、社会学和心理学。此外，我得到了兰德公司劳工和人口部门的支持，不仅可以访问兰德公司的广泛资源，还可以访问我在加州大学洛杉矶分校 (UCLA)、芝加哥大学、伦敦学院的合作者的资源伊拉斯姆斯大学和纽约州立大学布法罗分校经济学博士。我的商业和管理技能，加上我进行高水平研究的能力，非常适合我建立一个研究小组，并建立和指导兰德中心，重点关注人力资本、健康和老龄化研究。 公共健康相关性：社会科学中最引人注目和最公认的发现之一是教育与健康之间的密切联系，然而，人们对这种健康差异背后的机制知之甚少。该项目通过进一步发展教育与健康的经济理论，使用结构性和简化形式的计量经济学技术测试其预测，并采用行为模型来评估替代制度/政策在创造健康、富裕方面的相对有效性，从而阐明了这种关系。和熟练的社会。