Income, education, and their effects on mental health : A study on individuals aged 50 and over in Europe and Israel

Sammanfattning: The thesis focuses on studying the effect that income and education can have on the mental health of single household individuals aged 50 and over in Europe and Israel. The data used is sourced from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (easySHARE) and includes interviews and observations from 2004 to 2022, being updated frequently. With the use of this longitudinal data, the dependent variable for this thesis is a 12-point scale which has been used to reflect an individual’s mental health status. Two models are used to analyze the data; one is a clustered OLS model and one an ordered probit regression, with mental health being split into three ordered categories. Despite issues such as endogeneity likely being present, the results for both regressions report statistically significant coefficients for a number of socio-economic factors. Specifically, they show that income improves mental health as it increases, with most of the marginal effects being reported in the lower quantiles of income. In addition, education has a positive effect on mental health of significant magnitude. However, women in the sample were more likely to have poor mental health, and age had a positive effect on mental health, which could be attributed to individuals’ changing attitude towards leisure and health in general.