Influenza Vaccination and Occupational Social Intensity: Evidence From U.S. Workers

We examine whether individuals with socially intensive occupations are empirically more likely to get vaccinated against flu. Socially active workers interact with a relatively large number of people and are therefore more likely to catch and spread infectious diseases. Vaccinating these workers against infectious disease therefore yields greater marginal social benefits than the average person. We construct multiple measures of social intensity from the Occupational Information Network. We find that workers in occupations with high social intensity are not significantly more likely to receive a flu shot. These results add to earlier findings that individuals' vaccination decisions are driven mainly by private valuations rather than social considerations. However, we provide the first direct evidence that individuals for whom vaccination would yield the greatest external benefits are not more likely to get vaccinated.