Foreword

Abstract

In 2018, Janet Currie visited the Institute for Fiscal Studies and delivered its Annual Lecture.11 Watch Janet's lecture here: https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/13452. The lecture focused on Janet's latest research work, investigating socio-economic differences in health and mortality, and the extent to which access to health care early in life matters for mortality and other health outcomes in the short and longer term, as children grow up and become adults. In her lecture, Janet compares inequality in mortality in the US, Canada and France, as well as across states in the US, to investigate the value of publicly provided health insurance for children in tackling inequalities in health outcomes and in increasing health outcomes for all. Her work clearly demonstrates the power and value of looking across countries to understand trends in inequality and the role of institutions in shaping them. Following her fascinating and inspiring lecture, we joined forces with Sonya Krutikova and invited Janet to collaborate with us in extending her agenda to a wider group of countries and produce a special issue of Fiscal Studies, showing how inequalities in mortality changed in these countries, which trends and patterns were common and where they differed. We were delighted that Janet was just as excited to embark on this project. Papers were commissioned from research teams working on related issues in North and South, West and East European countries, a combination that we felt would extend the existing analysis of US, Canada and France to a richer and wider variety of contexts in the developed world. We were also incredibly fortunate that the group of lead researchers behind the comparative project, including James Banks, Kjell Salvanes and Hannes Schwandt, joined Janet and Sonya as guest editors for this special issue. This issue contains an introductory piece from the guest editors, a three-country paper by Janet and co-authors that updates her annual lecture, and eight single country papers from different research teams across Europe. The resulting issue makes a terrific contribution to the understanding of how inequalities in health and income have evolved together over the last three decades, demonstrating the diversity of experiences across countries and relating these differences to the historical and institutional features of each country. The Editors of Fiscal Studies,