Testosterone is associated with self-employment among Australian men

Francis J. Greene; Liang Han; Sean Martin; Song Zhang; Gary Wittert

doi:10.1016/j.ehb.2013.02.003

Testosterone is associated with self-employment among Australian men

Francis J. Greene, Liang Han, Sean Martin, Song Zhang, Gary Wittert

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Abstract

Testosterone has pronounced effects on men's physiological development and smaller, more nuanced, impacts on their economic behavior. In this study of 1199 Australian adult males, we investigate the relationship between the self-employed and their serum testosterone levels. Because prior studies have identified that testosterone is a hormone that is responsive to external factors (e.g. competition, risk-taking), we explicitly control for omitted variable bias and reverse causality by using an instrumental variable approach. We use insulin as our primary instrument to account for endogeneity between testosterone and self-employment. This is because prior research has identified a relationship between insulin and testosterone but not between insulin and self-employment. Our results show that there is a positive association between total testosterone and self-employment. Robustness checks using bioavailable testosterone and another similar instrument (daily alcohol consumption) confirm this positive finding.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	76-84
Journal	Economics & Human Biology
Volume	13
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2013.02.003
Publication status	Published - 1 Mar 2014

Keywords

Testosterone
Self-employment
Hormones
Labor markets

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10.1016/j.ehb.2013.02.003

ZHANG_2014_cright_EHB_Testosterone is Associated with Self-Employment among Australian Men
NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Economics and Human Biology. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Economics and Human Biology, 3, Mar 2014, DOI: 10.1016/j.ehb.2013.02.003
Accepted author manuscript (Post-print), 217 KBLicence: CC BY

http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S1570677X13000269

Cite this

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title = "Testosterone is associated with self-employment among Australian men",

abstract = "Testosterone has pronounced effects on men's physiological development and smaller, more nuanced, impacts on their economic behavior. In this study of 1199 Australian adult males, we investigate the relationship between the self-employed and their serum testosterone levels. Because prior studies have identified that testosterone is a hormone that is responsive to external factors (e.g. competition, risk-taking), we explicitly control for omitted variable bias and reverse causality by using an instrumental variable approach. We use insulin as our primary instrument to account for endogeneity between testosterone and self-employment. This is because prior research has identified a relationship between insulin and testosterone but not between insulin and self-employment. Our results show that there is a positive association between total testosterone and self-employment. Robustness checks using bioavailable testosterone and another similar instrument (daily alcohol consumption) confirm this positive finding.",

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author = "Greene, {Francis J.} and Liang Han and Sean Martin and Song Zhang and Gary Wittert",

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AU - Greene, Francis J.

AU - Han, Liang

AU - Martin, Sean

AU - Zhang, Song

AU - Wittert, Gary

N1 - NOTICE: this is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Economics and Human Biology. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Economics and Human Biology, 3, Mar 2014, DOI: 10.1016/j.ehb.2013.02.003

PY - 2014/3/1

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N2 - Testosterone has pronounced effects on men's physiological development and smaller, more nuanced, impacts on their economic behavior. In this study of 1199 Australian adult males, we investigate the relationship between the self-employed and their serum testosterone levels. Because prior studies have identified that testosterone is a hormone that is responsive to external factors (e.g. competition, risk-taking), we explicitly control for omitted variable bias and reverse causality by using an instrumental variable approach. We use insulin as our primary instrument to account for endogeneity between testosterone and self-employment. This is because prior research has identified a relationship between insulin and testosterone but not between insulin and self-employment. Our results show that there is a positive association between total testosterone and self-employment. Robustness checks using bioavailable testosterone and another similar instrument (daily alcohol consumption) confirm this positive finding.

AB - Testosterone has pronounced effects on men's physiological development and smaller, more nuanced, impacts on their economic behavior. In this study of 1199 Australian adult males, we investigate the relationship between the self-employed and their serum testosterone levels. Because prior studies have identified that testosterone is a hormone that is responsive to external factors (e.g. competition, risk-taking), we explicitly control for omitted variable bias and reverse causality by using an instrumental variable approach. We use insulin as our primary instrument to account for endogeneity between testosterone and self-employment. This is because prior research has identified a relationship between insulin and testosterone but not between insulin and self-employment. Our results show that there is a positive association between total testosterone and self-employment. Robustness checks using bioavailable testosterone and another similar instrument (daily alcohol consumption) confirm this positive finding.

KW - Testosterone

KW - Self-employment

KW - Hormones

KW - Labor markets

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VL - 13

SP - 76

EP - 84

JO - Economics & Human Biology

JF - Economics & Human Biology

ER -

Testosterone is associated with self-employment among Australian men

Abstract

Keywords

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