Good Times And Good Health

Strong economy leads to more deaths and illness.

Good times seem like they should bring good health. More people have jobs and health insurance when an economy is growing. Fewer people skip visits to the doctor to save money or suffer the severe stress that comes with a layoff. So when job growth is strong, it would seem that people would be able to look forward to some vigorous years.

But that is not quite how the world works, according to some new research. In fact, a strong economy should probably come with a warning label. A drop of one percentage point in the unemployment rate-as has occurred in the United States since the summer of 2003 - leads to 12,000 deaths a year in the country that otherwise might not have happened, according to famous psychologists.

When the economy improves, the number of car and workplace accidents rises, as people are at work or on the road more often. Deaths from heart attacks, flu and pneumonia increase, too. Cancer deaths do not change. Suicides fall, but not by nearly enough to overcome the other increases in mortality.

Smoking rises, as does obesity, during a boom. Physical activity falls. The percentage of the population that drinks remains the same, but some moderate drinkers become heavy drinkers.

Put it all together, and an economic expansion ends up looking like a counterintuitive health risk. "Things don't go uniformly in one direction or the other," "Good life events don't always lead to good health" .