6. Concluding remarks
In2009, suicide was the10thleading cause ofdeathinthe United States. The recent upsurge in America’s suicide rates (Fig. 1) suggests that one or more of suicide risk factors have become more prevalent in the U.S., which may in turn point to deteriorating mental health of some Americans. As seen from Figs. 3–5, the post2000 increase in America’s suicide rate is mainly driven by the suicide rates of the population 35 to 64 years old, especially that of the females.32 Therefore, any successful suicide prevention policy should take into consideration different dynamics of suicide across different population subgroups. It was based on this logic that this study attempted to provide an analysis of suicide in the 32 Between 1999 and 2007, the suicide rates of American women and men aged 35–64 years old grew by 25.8 and 16.7 percent respectively. United States between 1979 and 2004 across six gender-by-age demographic categories. The main findings of this study suggest that the deteriorations in labor market conditions may in fact be linked to higher incidences of suicide among prime working-age (35–64 years old) men and women. The results of different econometric specifications and techniques show that, the positive correlations between suicide rate and unemployment rate as well as its volatility and its deviation from trend are only present for men and women 35–64 years old. The main policy implication of this finding is that during periods of increasing unemployment and uncertainties in the labor market, suicide prevention efforts must target their resource toward the population aged 35–64 years old. However in doing so, gender differences must be heeded. The results suggestthat suicide rates of prime working-age men is more responsive to changes in the deviation of the unemployment rate of this population group from its trend, while the suicide rate of females in the same age group is more sensitive to changes in the unemployment rate. Therefore, in states with historically high unemployment rates and relatively small changes in the trends (for example a jump from a historical rate of 15% to 18%) suicide prevention resources must be targeted more toward 35–64 females. Moreover, during cases of relatively large and sudden jumps of unemployment rates at relatively low levels (for example a jump from a historical rate of 4% to 8%), the focus of such program must be shifted more toward males 35–64. Finally, in cases where historically high unemployment rates are also coincided with relatively large deviation from trend (for example a jump from a historical rate of 15% to 25%) suicide prevention programs musttarget both male and females in the 35–64 age range.
