The reciprocal relationship between depressive symptoms and employment status.

This paper analyzes the reciprocal lagged relationship between depressive symptoms and employment status. We find that severe depressive symptoms contribute to a 25.6% increase in subsequent non-employment rates, a 20.7% increase in non-participation rates and 34.2% increase in unemployment rates, for men. Similar, although weaker, marginal effects are found for women. However, we find no evidence for men and only limited evidence for women that unemployment, non-employment, or non-participation raises the risks of severe depressive symptoms. We observe an impact of labor market status on depressive symptoms only when using point-in-time measures.

The Great Recession and Children's Mental Health in Australia.

This paper analyzes the effects of "shocks" to community-level unemployment expectations, induced by the onset of the Great Recession, on children's mental well-being. The Australian experience of the Great Recession represents a unique case study as despite little change in actual unemployment rates, levels of economic uncertainty grew. This affords us the ability to examine the effects of shocks to economic expectations independent of any actual changes to economic conditions. We draw on and link data from multiple sources, including several waves of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (2004⁻2010), a consumer sentiment survey, and data on local economic conditions. Using our purpose-built data set, we estimate difference-in-differences models to identify plausibly causal effects. We find, for boys, there is no detectable effect of community-level unemployment expectations shocks on mental health. For girls, however, there are modest increases in mental health problems and externalizing behaviors, as measured by the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). We additionally find no discernible change in mother's psychological distress as a result of expectations shocks. These results are stable after controlling for actual labor market conditions.

Sickness absence and mental health: evidence from a nationally representative longitudinal survey.

OBJECTIVES: Previous studies have consistently reported evidence of large significant associations between measures of psychological health and sickness absence. Some of this association, however, may be confounded by relevant covariates that have not been controlled. By using data with repeated observations from the same individuals, this study aimed to quantify the bias due to unobserved characteristics that are time invariant. METHODS: Longitudinal data from the Household, Income, and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey were used to estimate negative binomial regression models of the number of annual paid sickness absence days. Observations spanning the period 2005-2012, and covering all employed persons aged 15-64 years, were used (56 348 observations from 13 622 individuals). RESULTS: Significant associations between the number of paid sickness absence days taken each year and scores on the mental health subscale of the SF-36 (MHI-5) were found. Inclusion of correlated random effects (which effectively control for unobserved person-specific factors that do not vary over time), however, resulted in a marked decline in the magnitude of this association. For persons with severe depressive symptoms (MHI-5 ≤52), the estimated incidence rate ratios were in the range 1.13-1.14 for men and 1.10-1.12 for women. CONCLUSIONS: Poor mental health is a risk factor affecting work attendance, but the magnitude of this effect, at least in a country where the rate of sickness absence is relatively low, is modest.