Examining the Healthy Migrant Paradox across Age Groups and Educational Levels in Europe

Isabel Sáenz Hernández , Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Aïda Solé-Auró, Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Luize Ratniece, Universitat Pompeu Fabra

The ability to age healthily highly depends on individual characteristics, such as gender, social class, biological, and migrant background, as well as contextual factors. Immigration has changed the demographic composition and the social structure of many western European countries and this has raised interest in how immigrants are ageing. This paper aims at examining the health of immigrants versus natives for individuals aged 50 years old and over using European longitudinal data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement (SHARE) across 7 waves (2004–2020). We use descriptive and multivariate models to analyze the association between migration status and health outcomes (chronic conditions, self-perceived health and GALI). In addition, we examine how this association varies across age groups and education levels, exploring two separate interactions: (1) the interaction between immigration status and education on health, and (2) the interaction between immigration status and age on health. The expected findings include support for the healthy immigrant paradox, but our results differ across countries and type of immigrants. We also expect that the better position of migrants based on their educational attainment might explain part of these health disparities between the two groups.

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 Presented in Session 107. Migration and Health