We apply the theory of inequality in opportunity to measure inequity in mortality. Our empirical work is based on a rich dataset for the Netherlands (1998-2007), linking information about mortality, health events and lifestyles. We show that distinguishing between different channels via which...

We discuss the conceptual foundations of measuring (in)equity in health and health care. After an overview of the recent developments in the measurement of socio-economic inequalities and in racial disparities, we show how these partial approaches can be seen as special cases of the more general...

This paper re-examines a counterintuitive corollary of utilitarianism under unequal longevities: the tendency to redistribute resources from short-lived towards long-lived agents, against any intuition of compensation. It is shown that this corollary prevails not only under time-additive...

There exist congenital diseases that reduce newborns' potential opportunities. This reduction is sometimes alleviated if the congenital disease is early detected thanks to a newborn screening program. We propose an outcome measurement of newborn screening programs based on the opportunity gains...

A premature death unexpectedly brings a life and a career to their end, leading to substantial welfare losses. We study the retirement decision in an economy with risky lifetime, and compare the laissez-faire with egalitarian social optima. We consider two social objectives: (1) the maximin on...

The built environment plays a key role in the strategy of “Aging in Place”. Here, we study the influence of the built environment on the health status of elderly people living in Brussels. Using census and geocoded data, we analysed if built environment factors were associated with poor...

This paper proposes a regional comparison of ex-post inequality of opportunity in France by measuring, within each region, the inequality between individuals exerting the same effort. According to the concept of equality of opportunity, inequalities due to factors for which the individual is not...

We analyse participation in medical prevention with an expected utility model that is sufficiently rich to capture diverging features of different prevention procedures. We distinguish primary and secondary prevention (with one or two rounds) for both fatal or non-fatal diseases. Moreover, we...

One of the greatest success stories in our societies is that people are living longer, life expectancy at birth being now above 80 years. Whereas the lengthening of life opens huge opportunities for individuals if extra years are spent in prosperity and good health, it is however often regarded...

This paper surveys recent theoretical economic research on long term care (LTC). LTC differs from health care: it is about nursing; it is mostly provided by unpaid caregivers (mainly spouses and children), whereas both the market and the State play a modest role. The future of LTC appears to be...