기초연금 도입에 따른 자가보고 건강지표 효과 분석: 한국복지패널을 이용하여

Abstract

Income is one of the most important determinants of health and is highly associated with health outcomes. Including the recent debate on universal basic income, discussions on the introduction of policies to increase income are being made. Information on causal impact of increased income on health would be helpful in public discussions and policy decisions. In South Korea, the basic pension policy, which pays approximately 200,000 Korean Won (equivalent to approximately 200 US Dollars) monthly to the lower 70% of income level of elderly people, was introduced in 2014. So far, studies on the socioeconomic impact of basic pension have been conducted, while few research has been carried its impact on health outcomes. The aim of this study was to examine the impact of basic pension on self-reported health indicators in Korea using the Korean Welfare Panel Study (KWPS). In this study, we analyzed 3,929 individuals aged 65 years or older, except for social assistance recipients, from the participants of the 9-11th waves of the KWPS. We calculated age-standardized prevalence of self-rated poor health, depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation. We also estimated their differences according to the eligibility of the basic pension. Difference in difference methodology was implemented to measure the impact of basic income on health status. We analyzed the interaction of age and basic pension at the predicted probabilities of self-rated poor health, depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation. When comparing the result of 9th and 11th waves according to the eligibility of basic pension, the ratio of the monthly household income of 11th wave to the monthly household income of the 9th wave was 1.05 for the eligible, and 1.03 for the non-eligible. Although age-standardized prevalence of self-rated poor health, depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation decreased over time, the prevalences continued to decrease only in the non-eligible. As a result, the prevalence difference of self-rated poor health, depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation according to basic pension eligibility increased 2.3%p, 3.0%p, and 0.5%p, respectively. As a result of the analysis with difference in difference method, any improvement in self-reported health indicators by the basic pension was not observed. No interaction effects between age and basic pension were found in the predicted probabilities of self-rated poor health, depressive symptoms and suicidal ideation. In summary, any meaningful impact of basic pension on self-reported health indicators was not demonstrated. This finding was expected since the household income among the eligible did not increase in proportion to the increase in basic pension. Inaddition, the length of the study period was relatively short and thus any long-term impact should be further explored. Moreover, impact of basic pension on other sensitive health outcome, e.g., food insecurity, should be investigated in the future.