Body mass index, waist circumference and employment: Evidence from older Irish adults

•We examine the relationship between fatness and obesity and employment status among older Irish adults.•A negative association of employment with BMI and waist circumference when these are entered linearly as continuous variables is limited to women.•A negative association of employment with obesity defined either using BMI or waist circumference as categorical variables is found for men and women.•The negative association between obesity and employment status is larger among women.•For women, the employment elasticity associated with waist circumference is larger than the elasticity associated with BMI.

Data from the first wave of the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing are used to examine the relationship between fatness and obesity and employment status among older Irish adults. Employment status is regressed on one of the following measures of fatness: BMI and waist circumference entered linearly as continuous variables and obesity as a categorical variable defined using both BMI and waist circumference. Controls for demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, socioeconomic characteristics in childhood and physical, mental and behavioural health are also included. The regression results for women indicate that all measures of fatness are negatively associated with the probability of being employed and that the employment elasticity associated with waist circumference is larger than the elasticity associated with BMI. The results for men indicate that employment is not significantly associated with BMI and waist circumference when these are entered linearly in the regression, but it is significantly and negatively associated with obesity defined either using BMI or waist circumference as categorical variables. The results also indicate that the negative association between obesity and employment status is larger among women. For example, the probability of being employed for the obese category defined using BMI is around 8 percentage points lower for women and 5 percentage points lower for men.