James P. Smith

Overview

James P. Smith is a Distinguished Chair and Senior Economist at the RAND Corporation. His research spans health economics, wealth dynamics, and the economics of aging, with a particular focus on the dynamic relationship between health and economic status across the life cycle. He co-developed the methodology for the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) and has produced foundational work on the SES–health gradient.

Key Contributions / Features

• Co-developer of the Health and Retirement Study (HRS) — the principal U.S. longitudinal panel for retirement and health research
• "Healthy Bodies and Thick Wallets" (JEP 1999): established the bidirectional health–wealth causal relationship; showed health shocks generate large permanent income losses but low-income → poor health is also causal
• "Unraveling the SES-Health Connection" (PDR 2004): documented the dynamic evolution of the SES–health gradient over the life course
• Co-author Banks, Blundell, and Smith (2003): US–UK household financial wealth comparison
• Co-author Banks, Marmot, Oldfield, and Smith (2006, JAMA): biological validation of US health disadvantage relative to England at every SES level

Related

• James Banks
• Michael Marmot
• Health and Retirement Study
• English Longitudinal Study of Aging
• American Health Disadvantage
• SES Health Behavior Gradient
• Income-Mortality Gradient

Sources

• Banks Marmot Oldfield and Smith 2006 — Disease and Disadvantage in the United States and in England