This thesis is developed in the context of investigating the health co-benefit of decarbonisation. Health co-benefit refers to the collateral benefit which arises from decarbonisation policies external to the main intended benefit of climate change mitigation via the reduction of Greenhouse Gases (GHG). Health co-benefit of this kind often arises via the corresponding reduction in air pollutants when GHG is reduced. This is because GHG and air pollutants such as particulate matter are often derived from the same source - the combustion of fossil fuels which drive economic activities. Existing literature in the health co-benefit of decarbonisation fail to give consider the effect of socio-economic variables such as income and education on the expected health co-benefits, and this is where the thesis begins. The backdrop of health co-benefit modelling and the need to incorporate socioeconomic considerations provide the impetus to develop a health economics model. However, in many ways this health economic model deviates from the health co-benefit studies methodologically and instead follows the tradition of the Health Capital Model developed by Grossman (1972). This is due to the micro-economic nature of this health economic model which employs standard economic theory and technique of optimisation, which differs from the fundamentally empirically driven approach of health co-benefit studies. The health economic model developed here is an opportunity to address some of the short-comings of the Health Capital Model. The health co-benefit background however provides some concrete context and inspiration for the application of the theoretical insights which can be drawn from this model. The main contribution of the model develop in this thesis from the theoretical point of view lies in the division of the lifecycle analysis of health into two distinct but related phases of childhood and adulthood. The two phases are specified with different assumptions reflecting the differing characteristics of childhood and adulthood. The most important distinction between the two phases is the manner in which investment in health capital (using time and goods resources) enters the modelling framework. In the childhood phase, health investment augments or increases the existing stock of health capital, while during the adulthood phase health investment prevents the decline of health but does not increase its stock. I believe this better reflects the biological behaviour of health over one's life than the HCM which implicitly assumes that new stock of health and existing stock are perfectly substitutable. In my model, this substitutability is possible only during the childhood corresponding with the body and mental development. On the other hand, during adulthood when them body no longer grows, health investment may only preserve health. After developing the model, I went about to test it empirically. I used the Understanding Society youth questionnaire to test the child model and the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) to test the adulthood model. Due to the way that optimisation problem was specified, the terminal end time conditional in the optimal control model became another endogenous variable. This variable is treated empirically as the life expectancy at the national level. I find that in general the empirical data strongly supports the theoretical propositions of my model. It should be noted here that since the main contribution of this thesis is in theoretical development, the empirical efforts were designed primarily with the intention of validating the propositions of the model, and not really for direct policy application. This is also reinforced by the use of ordered logit models where the coefficients of the independent variables on the dependent variable generally have no meaning, where we only concentrate on the signs of the relationship. Having successfully developed the model, it is applied in two policy settings. Firstly, through reformulation of the model gives the inclusion of socio-economic variables in the measure of Relative Risk (RR) a theoretical grounding. We utilised the Global Burden of Disease (GBD) data to compute RR across 180 countries in the world and regressed with World Bank data on ambient particulate matter pollution as well as GDP per capita. The former variable represents the exogenous rate of depreciation while the latter socio-economic variables, particularly income. I find that the RR is negatively associated with the GDP per capita at the national level. Using the estimated coefficients with the help of Professor Crawford-Brown we attempted to forecast how GDP per capita will interact with the health co-benefits of decarbonisation under a range of future scenarios. The second application of the model is in its use to predict the inequality implications of decarbonisation policy. This is performed by taking the second order partial derivative of an endogenous variable such as health, as will be described in detail later. This approach is sufficiently flexible to accommodate the prediction of inequality over range of policies and variables. The inequality implications and predictions according to this model are not tested empirically here. However, they are perhaps the most fruitful area for future research.

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Recent studies indicate that alcohol consumption may affect economic outcomes through its effects on health capital and social capital. If, in fact, differences in economic outcomes are causally linked to differences in alcohol consumption, then lack of adequate insight into such connectivity may adversely affect the labor market and retirement outcomes of some groups of individuals in society. In two essays, this dissertation examines the impact of alcohol consumption on wealth at retirement using data from the RAND Health and Retirement Study (HRS) from 1992 through 2002; and the effects of alcohol consumption on employment duration and earnings using the Geocode version of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY1979) micro dataset from 1984 through 1996. This dissertation relies on Grossman's 1972 health capital model. Empirically, the research relies on panel data methods and duration analysis to determine whether differences in economic outcomes can be explained by differences in alcohol consumption. The results indicate that drinking is positively related to improved socioeconomic outcomes as compared to total abstention, when endogeneity has not been taken into account under both duration analysis and panel data methods. When endogeneity is taken into account, alcohol consumption tends to shorten the duration of employment via survival analysis. Also, estimation via instrumental variables approach indicates that the relationship between alcohol consumption and socioeconomic outcomes (retirement wealth and earnings) is rather an inverted U-shaped for some panel data specifications. Moreover, the effects of alcohol consumption on retirement wealth and earnings tend to diminish with instrumental variables approach. These findings did not change even with abstainers partitioned into lifetime abstainers and infrequent or light drinkers (less than one drinking day per week).

Abstract In recent years, many economists point out that physical capital stock and human capital stock cannot identify the difference of income effectively. Therefore, they attempt to add more interpreted variables, trying to illustrate economic growth that physical capital and human capital cannot explain. In general, economic growth theory has been applied to cross-country studies, and empirical researches of single country are limited. The main reason is that one cannot know how to measure the physical capital stock between states of a country efficiently. According to the method of Garofalo and Yamarik (2002), one can estimate the physical capital stocks of each state of the United States and justify the validity of Solow growth model. This paper specifically focuses on the so called new economy era (1990-2000). Our primary goal is to expand the existing models into more comprehensive one by including more explanatory variables. In 1999, The Nobelist -Grossman- released the concept of health capital ¡§One can choose the length of life¡¨. Each will be endowed initial value of health stock which depreciates through time and appreciates through the self-investment, exercising, for example. Health capital is also a kind of element of human capital; it will help human capital work normally. For this reason, we consider to measure U.S. output not only consider the effects of accumulation of physical capital and human capital, but also contains contributions of health capital. To analyze economic implications in three models from this study, there are several remarks can be drown¡G Firstly, physical capital and human capital provide significantly positive effect for economic growth rates of U.S. states from 1990 to 2000. The magnitude of estimated coefficient of physical capital has been decreasing, which denotes two phenomenons. In the one hand, physical capitals positively contribute the US economic growth. On the other hand, its influence to economic growth has marginally decreased over time. In contrast to physical capitals, human capital has shown constantly increasing influence to the US economic growth. Secondly, after adding the variable of health capital, the model can account the large scale of variation of the U.S. economic growth. The reason is that agents in the economy add their own length of life in the model and, then defer retirement and extend their productivities to economic growth. Thirdly, although term of is a random variable of cross states in the model; despite of technology stock, it comprises different endowment of resource, geographical location and institution etc. Therefore, it displays individual characteristics of every state. Hence, economic growth will reveal significant and positive beneficial result when we can think about more component of (for instant, adding political party variables) to improve and develop it. Lastly, we have low adjusted in this paper, and maybe because we focus on long-run output, and do not look upon puzzle of short-run business cycle. Romer (1987) denotes that short-run business cycle of economic variables dominates change of some variables for contributing long-run economic growth that will make estimation to convert nefficiently. Synthesizing the above mentioned consequences, one can find that U.S. impressed economic performance from 1990 to 2000. Not only contribute physical capital and human capital to the economy, health capital is another key element to maintain such sustained economic growth. Consequently, we suggest that if a nation pays more attention to health capital, which will result in economic growth and increase competitiveness for the nation. The results of this paper using the US as a sample may can serve as a reference to other countries using as a example to improve economic growth in the future.

The health of employees is an important clause for doing any type of business. Investing in health capital helps to increase the productivity, reduce the number of disability days and increase the attractiveness of companies in the labor market. The purpose of the master’s thesis is to develop a methodological approach of health capital assessment to improve the enterprise performance. The thesis reviewed the conceptions of health capital and the issues of correlation between investments in health capital and measures of enterprise performance. The research has drawn on such sources as education and research literature, the results of self-conducted empirical research, corporate statistics data. In the master's thesis, a methodological approach to assessing capital was developed based on the Cobb-Douglas production function, which reflects the effect on health capital on the efficiency of the enterprise. This represented approach is suitable for any organization and desined to calculate indicators for assessing health capital and to determine future development options. / Здоровые сотрудники являются необходимым условием для ведения любого бизнеса. Инвестиции в капитал здоровья способствуют повышению производительности работников, снижению числа дней нетрудоспособности и повышению привлекательности компании на рынке труда. Целью магистерской диссертации является разработка методического подхода к оценке капитала здоровья для повышения эффективности деятельности предприятия. В работе рассматривается генезис понятия капитал здоровья и вопросы взаимосвязи инвестиций в капитал здоровья с показателями эффективности деятельности предприятия. В качестве источников использовалась учебно-методическая и научно-исследовательская литература, результаты эмпирических исследований автора и данные корпоративной статистики. В магистерской диссертации был разработан методический подход к оценке капитала здоровья на основе производственной функции Кобба-Дугласа, отражающей влияние капитала здоровья на эффективность деятельности предприятия, позволяющей рассчитать показатели для проведения оценки капитала здоровья и определить варианты для развития на перспективу.

In this study similarities and differences in health experiences among urban poor in relation to the forms of capital they possess: economic, social, cultural, and health capital and the different positions they hold in the urban field, are analyzed. The research was conducted in two poor gecekondu neighborhoods in Altindag, Baraj and G&uuml / ltepe, via face to face interviews with 40 individuals. A main finding has been that the different forms of capital, in volume as well as in composition, had an influence on the urban poor&rsquo / s health perceptions, health care access, health seeking strategies and experiences in health institutions. The rural-urban migrants refer to a habitus in relation to health which still strongly relies on their rural practices. Major differences among men and women have been observed, where men seem to be more open to integrate into the urban dispositions. Economic capital plays a crucial role. Regular income earners do tend to emphasize that they have a certain autonomy and control over their health. On the other hand, benefit dependent poor mention that they have less control over their health. Economic capital can be seen as very much the same among the group studied, but the differences in health experiences rely strongly on Cultural capital is understood as their different identities: villager/non-villager / illiterate/ non-illiterate / women/men / healthy/non-healthy. Social capital (formal and informal solidarity networks) is studied as the role in health experiences, access to health care and strategies to use the existing health system / as well as how individuals support each other materially and immaterially. Social capital is important because it converts into economic capital, not as exchange but as use value. An analysis of the different forms of capital allows us to address at the interrelationship of structural conditions in the field and the practices actors experience through their internalized habitus. Health experiences therefore differ even among a socio-economic homogenous group. In addition to the above mentioned forms of capital, it is also argued that health itself should be considered as a form of capital. Health capital (self perceived health/illness and medically diagnosed disease) influences and is influenced by the other forms of capital.

This dissertation consists of three essays concerning the effects of human capital and health capital on the labor market. Chapter 1 presents a structural model that incorporates a health capital stock to the traditional learning-by-doing model. The model allows health to affect future wages by interrupting current labor supply and on-the-job human capital accumulation. Using data on sick time from the Panel Study Income of Dynamics the model is estimated using a nonlinear Generalized Method of Moments estimator. The results show human capital production exhibits diminishing returns. Health capital production increases with the current stock of health capital, or better current health improves future health. Among prime age working men, the effect of health on human capital accumulation is relatively small. Chapter 2 explores the role of another form of human capital, noncognitive skills, in explaining racial gaps in wages. Chapter 2 adds two noncognitive skills, locus of control and self-esteem, to a simple wage specification to determine the effect of these skills on the racial wage gap (white, black, and Hispanic) and the return to these skills across the wage distribution. The wage specifications are estimated using pooled, between, and quantile estimators. Results using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 show these skills account for differing portions of the racial wage gap depending on race and gender. Chapter 3 synthesizes the idea of health and on-the-job human capital accumulation from Chapter 1 with the idea of noncognitive skills in Chapter 2 to examine the influence of these skills on human capital and health capital accumulation in adult life. Chapter 3 introduces noncognitive skills to a life cycle labor supply model with endogenous health and human capital accumulation. Noncognitive skills, measured by degree of future orientation, self-efficacy, trust-hostility, and aspirations, exogenously affect human capital and health production. The model uses noncognitive skills assessed in the early years of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and relates these skills to health and human capital accumulation during adult life. The main findings suggest individuals with high self-efficacy receive higher future wages.

Cette thèse a pour objectif de définir le rôle des dépenses de la branche maladie du système de santé en France, et notamment d’identifier dans quelle mesure les soins représentent un coût ou un investissement. Elle repose sur l’étude des interdépendances entre les soins et les arrêts maladie de plus de cent mille salariés suivis entre 2009 et 2012. Les résultats démontrent la double composante préventive et curative de tout soin.Notre premier travail consiste à identifier le surcoût des soins dû à la mauvaise santé, à partir d’un modèle régressant le coût des soins sur le fait d’avoir été absent en 2012 : il existe alors un coût significatif de ces soins assimilés à de la consommation.A partir d’un modèle de Poisson à inflation de zéros, nous réfléchissons ensuite aux déterminants des arrêts maladie, et notamment au rôle du secteur d’activité dans un portefeuille de salariés du secteur privé. Il apparaît que si la différence de prise d’arrêt reflète des conditions de travail, la disparité dans la durée s’apparente plus à des conditions d’emploi et à un climat social.Nous nous intéressons par ailleurs au rôle préventif des soins, du fait qu’ils réduisent significativement le nombre futur de jours d’arrêt maladie, et ce à travers un modèle de poisson sur données de panel qui prend en compte le problème de condition initiale.Notre dernière classification des comportements de recours aux soins et des arrêts maladie montre le capital santé comme continuum où sont opérés des investissements. / The purpose of this dissertation is to define the role of French healthcare expenditures, and to identify whether care represent a cost or an investment. We use the inter-relationships between care and sick leaves for more than a hundred thousand employees. Results show a combination of preventive and curative impact of any care expenditure.By regressing additional care cost on having declared a sick leave, we highlight the significant cost of care that can be likened to consumption.With a zero inflated Poisson model, we also investigate sick leave’s key factors. In particular we focus on sectors and find that working conditions differentiate probability of sick leave, whereas employment conditions and social environment discriminate between sick leave’s durations.We then examine the preventive role of care, reducing significantly the number of sick leave days for the next year : A Poisson regression model is used where the initial condition problem has been taken into account.In our last approach, we statically classify health care and sick leave behavior to finally show that health capital can be viewed as a continuum for which investments are realized.

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This case study explores a recent argument claiming improvements in refugees' healthcare encounters in Norway primarily occur due to the refugee's own effort of adjusting, rather than the healthcare system's efforts. While investigating the perceptions of three Middle eastern refugees in the municipality of Kvinnherad, the aim of the paper was to gain a deeper understanding of the gaps between refugee patients and the healthcare service. By discussing the refugees' perceptions of important factors for improvement in their healthcare encounters, and linking them to the theories of social and cultural capital, the research finds that despite legal right to services and healthcare systems principle of offering equal access for all, refugees can hold a disadvantage in accessing and recieving care. Additionally to being a contribution to the academic research field on refugees meeting with new healthcare systems, the case study brings a new layer of knowledge about refugees' familiarization process in the municipality of Kvinnherad.