Widening or narrowing inequalities in health? Comparing Britain and Finland from the 1980s to the 1990s

This paper sheds light on the debate about whether class inequalities have given way to new divisions by employment status, by comparing changes in he alth inequalities among British and Finnish men and women between 1986 and 1994, Britain experienced high unemployment in the 1980s whereas Finland ex perienced a sudden increase of unemployment in the early 1990s. We examine how these contrasting labour market situations have influenced changes in h ealth inequalities by employment status and social class using comparable p opulation surveys. In Finland health inequalities by employment status narr owed among men, whereas in Britain they widened or remained stable, with a less strong pattern of change for women. We found similar or slightly large r health inequalities by class among all adults than among the currently em ployed, with larger class inequalities in Finland than in Britain. We concl ude that in countries with high levels of unemployment, there; are smaller class inequalities in health among the employed labour force because of the greater chance of a 'healthy worker effect'.