Transcript Does the economy affect trends in suicide?

Group 4
Shelly Matushevski
Karen Pavlisko
Bennett Cowie
Matt Morrison
November 23, 2009
Introduction
 Can money buy happiness?
=
 Do times of economic hardship affect the rates of
suicide in the United States?
 Weakening economy


Rising unemployment rates
Slow GDP growth
 Spill over onto an individual’s mental health
 Is there a direct relationship between the economy and
suicide rates?
Theory
 One may speculate there is a relationship between an
economy in recession and the depletion of a person’s
mental health
 Spurred by rising unemployment rates, falling profits of
businesses, and fear of bankruptcy for businesses and
individuals
 Does worry (about economic issues) lead to stress, then
lead to depression, and then maybe even onto suicide?
 One might wonder whether or not
the suicide rate is in fact related to
the business cycle
Method
 Use of economic research related to the economies
affect on suicide rates
 Excel spreadsheets constructed with data from reliable
sources to create a useable data set in SAS
 Importation of raw data into SAS
 Analysis of data in SAS to determine trends between
suicides and recessions
Research Findings
 Ethnic and Sex Differences in Suicide Rates Relative to





Major Depression in the United States
Antidepressants and Suicide Risk in the United States,
1985-1999
Does unemployment increase suicide rates? The OECD
Panel Evidence
Economic Theory of Suicide
Happiness and Economic Performance
The Economy and Suicide: a Time-Series Study of the
U.S.A.
Research Findings
 Economic data was compared to three socio-
demographic factors that can cause depression
 Low income
 Unemployment
 Disrupted marriages
 Males from all ethnic groups have higher suicide rates
than females
 Women were twice as likely to be suffering from
depression due to the three socio-demographic factors
 Victims undergo major depression before time of
death
Results
-the regression line
is shown graphing
the suicide rate
dependent upon
changes in GDP.
-p-value = .1350,
much larger than
accepted alpha of
.05
-R2 value= .0907
The R2-value
represents how well
the regression line is
able to approximate
the actual data.
-Very weak
relationship
Results
-regression line is
shown graphing
suicide rate
dependent upon the
unemployment rate
-p-value = .0007,
smaller than
accepted alpha of
.05
-R2 value also shows
the trend is much
more significant at
.3885
-Useful model
Results
-suicide rates as a
whole steadily
decline for a 15 year
period beginning
in 1986
-Appears to be a
period of lag.
Between 1983 and
1986,
unemployment
rates fell, suicide
rates actually rose
-Between 1990 to
1992 rates in suicide
decreased while the
unemployment rate
increased severely
References

Grunebaum, Michael, Steven Ellis, Shuhua Li, Maria Oquendo, and J. John Mann."Antidepressants and Suicide Risk in
the United States, 1985-1999." Journal of Clinical Psychiatry. November 2004.
http://excalibur.cpmc.columbia.edu/reprints/Grunebaum%20et%20al%20JCP%202003.pdf (accessed
November 5, 2009).

Hamermesh, Daniel, and Neal Soss. "An Economic Theory of Suicide." The Journal of Political Economy. February 1974.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1830901?seq=1 (accessed November 5, 2009).

Noh, Yong-Hwan. "Does Unemployment Increase Suicide Rates? The OECD Panel Evidence.“ Journal of Economic
Psychology. August 2009. http://journals.ohiolink.edu/ejc/pdf.cgi/Noh_YongHwan.pdf?issn=01674870&issue=v30i0004&article=575_duisrtope (accessed November 5, 2009).

Oquendo, Maria, Steven Ellis, Steven Greenwald, Kevin Malone, Myrna Weissman, and J. John Mann. Ethnic and Sex
Differences in Suicide Rates Relative to Major Depression in the United States. October 2001.
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/158/10/1652#SEC2 (accessed November 5, 2009).

Oswald, Andrew. "Happiness and Economic Performance." The Economic Journal. 1997.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2957911 (accessed November 5, 2009 ).

Ruhm, Christopher. "Are Recessions good for your Health?" The Quarterly Journal of Economics. May 2000.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2587005?&Search=yes&term=recessions&term=suicide&list=hide&searchUri=%
2Faction%2FdoAdvancedSearch%3Fq0%3Dsuicide%2Band%2Brecessions%26f0%3Dall%26c0%3DAND%26q
1%3D%26f1%3Dall%26c1%3DAND%26q2%3D%26f2%3Dall%26c2%3DAND%26q3%3D%26f3% (accessed
November 5, 2009).

Yang, Bijou. “The economy and suicide: a time-series study of the U.S.A.” American Journal of Economics and
Sociology, volume 51, no. 1 January 1992 (pp. 87-99)