Open AccessUnemployment during the Great Recession and large-for-gestational age births
Author(s) -
Vanessa M. Oddo,
Jessica C. JonesSmith
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
plos one
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.99
H-Index - 332
ISSN - 1932-6203
DOI - 10.1371/journal.pone.0233734
Subject(s) - unemployment , demography , recession , gestational age , medicine , percentile , birth weight , obesity , pregnancy , economics , endocrinology , statistics , biology , mathematics , sociology , keynesian economics , genetics , economic growth
Background Several studies have suggested that record high unemployment during the Great Recession was associated with deleterious changes in diet and weight-related health. However, studies have yet to explore whether the Great Recession was also associated with obesity-related health in utero . Methods We investigated whether increasing county-level unemployment was associated with large-for-gestational-age (LGA) births, using repeated cross-sectional data from California birth records between 2008 and 2011 (n = 1,715,052). LGA was defined as >90 th percentile, using the Oken reference. We use the annual 1-year lagged value for county-level unemployment (2007–2010) and limit our analyses to singleton, term births. Linear probability models, with county and year fixed-effects were used to examine the unemployment-LGA association. All models control for county-level foreclosure rates, child gender, and maternal age, parity, education, and race/ethnicity. Results An increase in county-level unemployment was not statistically significantly associated with the prevalence of LGA (percentage point [PP]: 0.12; 95% CI: -0.02, 0.25). But, over the period of observation, for every one standard deviation increase in unemployment, LGA prevalence increased by 5% and p = 0.08. Conclusions These results cautiously suggest some deleterious effects of the Great Recession on obesity-related health in utero .