Table 1.
Sample Characteristics
| Panel A. Demographics | Mean ± SD or % | |
|---|---|---|
| Year of birth | 1928 ± 14 | |
| Race | ||
| White | 80.2 | |
| Black | 19.8 | |
| Female | 54.8 | |
| Household size | 2.7 ± 1.5 | |
| Education | ||
| Less than high school | 38.0 | |
| High school | 31.3 | |
| More than high school | 30.7 | |
| Age at interview | 58.0 ± 16.4 | |
| Panel B. Education Quality | Mean ± SD or % | |
| Student-teacher ratio | 30.9 ± 5.5 | |
| Per-pupil expendituresa (USD) | 62.3 ± 36.3 | |
| Term length (days) | 170.8 ± 15.8 | |
| Panel C. Health Outcomes | Mean ± SD or % | Sample size |
| Objective | ||
| Systolic blood pressure (mmHg) | 134.1 ± 22.8 | 32,440 |
| Diastolic blood pressure (mmHg) | 78.1 ± 14.8 | 32,429 |
| Total cholesterol (mg/dL) | 216.5 ± 46.8 | 32,277 |
| High-density lipoprotein cholesterol (mg/dL) | 52.3 ± 16.5 | 20,539 |
| Triglycerides (mg/dL) | 152.2 ± 119.0 | 13,530 |
| Low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (mg/dL) | 125.9 ± 38.4 | 6,119 |
| C-reactive protein (mg/dL) | 0.5 ± 1.0 | 13,863 |
| Telomere length (base pairs) | 5,523 ± 557 | 2,546 |
| Diabetesb | 12.8 | 16,766 |
| Self-reported | ||
| Heart attack | 6.1 | 34,224 |
| Hypertension | 39.7 | 32,538 |
| Diabetes | 10.1 | 32,344 |
| Current smoking | 23.1 | 24,377 |
N = 34,770 overall, with smaller sample sizes for outcomes that were not collected in all waves or for all respondents. Study sample was drawn from repeated cross-sectional waves of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).
a
Per-pupil expenditures were inflation-adjusted to 1982–1984 U.S. dollars.
b
For serum testing of diabetes, earlier waves of NHANES used 2-hour glucose testing, while later waves used hemoglobin A1c. For consistency, we transformed these into a binary measure of whether they exceeded the cut-off for diabetes (i.e., glucose ≥ 200, hemoglobin A1c ≥ 6.5).