26(30)
8
Concluding discussion
The main conclusion is that there is intergenerational transmission of sick
leave and that this transmission is stronger the more sick leave the parents
have. That is, the parental heritage is of greater importance for explaining
higher levels of sickness absence than lower levels.
We also find that people tend to live in a household with a rate of sick leave
that is reminiscent of the rate of sick leave in their parental household. In
accordance with earlier literature about intergenerational mobility, this
phenomenon seems to be particularly strong among daughters (Hirvonen,
2008). This result suggests that the intergenerational mobility of sick leave
is even lower at the household level than the mobility at the individual level
on which we mainly focus in this study.
Earlier research has shown that firstborn children tend to be more
successful on the labour market and the explanation seems to be the social
rank within the family during childhood (e.g., Kristensen and Bjerkedal,
2007). We show that firstborn daughters as adults tend to have higher
levels of sickness absence than their younger biological siblings, but only if
the parents had low levels of sick leave during their childhood. Among sons
and in families in which the parents had high levels of sick leave, we find no
difference in sick leave among siblings as adults. Thus, the social rank
among siblings in this context only matters among women without a large
transmission of sick leave from their parents.
To conclude, this study has shown that there is intergenerational
transmission of sick leave and that this transmission is particularly strong
from parents with a high rate of sick leave. To understand the mechanisms
behind the intergenerational transmission of sick leave, more analyses are
needed.
