Duration of unemployment and self-perceived health in Europe

This study highlights the strong relation between unemployment, especially long-term unemployment, and poor self-perceived health. It shows that unemployment increased bad and very bad self-perceived health in European countries between 2004 and 2013. The longer the duration of unemployment, the stronger is the effect on self-perceived health.

The study helps evaluate more comprehensively the impact of the crisis, (long-term) unemployment and inactivity on the health of individuals, thus showing that the labour market situation spills over into other important areas of public policy such as healthcare.