DOUBLE JEOPARDY, AGING AS LEVELER, OR PERSISTENT HEALTH INEQUALITY - A LONGITUDINAL ANALYSIS OF WHITE AND BLACK-AMERICANS

Longitudinal data from a 15-year national survey of adults are used to test the double jeopardy to health hypothesis as well as the alternat ive hypotheses that aging levels ethnic differences and that health in equalities persist across the life course. Findings show that African Americans began the study in poorer health and manifested higher morta lity. Among survivors, young and middle-aged Black adults developed mo re serious illness and their subjective health declined more rapidly t han their White counterparts during the first 10 years of the study. A mong subjects with heart failure, Black people were also more likely t han Whites to become more disabled over time. Depending upon the healt h measure considered and the analytic strategy applied, there was evid ence for all three processes, but the weight of the evidence shows per sistent health inequality over the life course. Indeed, evidence for t he age-as-leveler thesis was eliminated by accounting for mortality du ring the study.