Partial Identification of Economic Mobility: With an Application to the United States

Abstract

The economic mobility of individuals and households is of fundamental interest. While many measures of economic mobility exist, reliance on transition matrices remains pervasive due to simplicity and ease of interpretation. However, estimation of transition matrices is complicated by the well-acknowledged problem of measurement error in self-reported and even administrative data. Existing methods of addressing measurement error are complex, rely on numerous strong assumptions, and often require data from more than two periods. In this article, we investigate what can be learned about economic mobility as measured via transition matrices while formally accounting for measurement error in a reasonably transparent manner. To do so, we develop a nonparametric partial identification approach to bound transition probabilities under various assumptions on the measurement error and mobility processes. This approach is applied to panel data from the United States to explore short-run mobility before and after the Great Recession.     

Changes in work and care trajectories during the transition to motherhood

In most mid- and high-income countries, there have been significant demographic, structural, and cultural changes in the past decades. However, we know little about how these changes have shaped women's work patterns during a key life stage: the transition to motherhood. Using longitudinal data from Chile, covering over 30 years of employment histories and three periods of first births (1980–2010), I conduct sequence analysis to identify women's work-care trajectories during an eight-year period of the transition to motherhood. Over time, I find that continuous care work at home has declined, for which education plays a key role, while the chances of working continuously have not changed over time. Instead, I find an increasing trend of unsteady paths that combine paid work with either caretaking or unemployment. I discuss how these changes, as well as their association with education, have important implications for both gender and social inequality.     

Estimating rating transition probabilites with missing data

In this article we provide a rigorous treatment of one of the central statistical issues of credit risk management. GivenK-1 rating categories, the rating of a corporate bond over a certain horizon may either stay the same or change to one of the remainingK-2 categories; in addition, it is usually the case that the rating of some bonds is withdrawn during the time interval considered in the analysis. When estimating transition probabilities, we have thus to consider aK-th category, called withdrawal, which contains (partially) missing data. We show how maximum likelihood estimation can be performed in this setup; whereas in discrete time our solution gives rigorous support to a solution often used in applications, in continuous time the maximum likelihood estimator of the transition matrix computed by means of the EM algorithm represents a significant improvement over existing methods.     

Leaving Home Early: Passing from Girlhood to Womanhood

This paper presents a case study of a young woman’s narrative of leaving home and her transition to adulthood. The case study is part of a larger research project about young women with an experience of an early break-up from home, through running away or being thrown out. Empirical material underlying this paper consists of a qualitative study of 12 young women that have been interviewed. The aim of the study is to understand how events like running away/being thrown out of home influences their transition to adulthood. The particular narrative demonstrates how a young woman presents and accounts for such a dramatic event as running away or being thrown out from home, and how that is understood in relation to her adulthood. A further aim is to illustrate how social services efforts are reflected in her narrative.     

Independent attributes control chart for Markov-dependent processes

Statistical process monitoring (SPM) is a very efficient tool to maintain and to improve the quality of a product. In many industrial processes, end product has two or more attribute-type quality characteristics. Some of them are independent, but the observations are Markovian dependent. It is essential to develop a control chart for such situations. In this article, we develop an Independent Attributes Control Chart for Markov Dependent Processes based on error probabilities criterion under the assumption of one-step Markov dependency. Implementation of the chart is similar to that of Shewhart-type chart. Performance of the chart has been studied using probability of detecting shift criterion. A procedure to identify the attribute(s) responsible for out-of-control status of the process is given.     

Closed-form likelihood estimation for one type of affine point processes

ABSTRACT

This paper presents a closed-form likelihood approximation for one type of affine point processes widely used in financial credit risk models. We proceed by first conjecturing the concrete series form of the transition density, verifying our postulation and then establishing the related coefficients by means of Kolmogorov equations. The asymptotic properties of the maximum-likelihood estimators (MLEs) are given in the end.     

Changes in HIV/AIDS knowledge and testing behavior in Africa: how much and for whom?

Demographic and Health Survey data from nine African countries make it clear that HIV/AIDS prevention knowledge has been increasing. Still, in many cases, fewer than half of adult respondents can identify specific prevention behaviors. Knowledge is lowest in rural areas and among women. HIV testing generally remains rare but is highly variable across countries, likely reflecting differences in the supply of testing services. In most cases, schooling and wealth impacts on prevention knowledge have either been stable or have increased; hence, in the majority of contexts, initial disparities in knowledge by education and wealth levels have persisted or widened.

Demographic differences in response rates for PHQ9 in a university student population

Objective: To examine differences in complete response rates for depression screening questions based on demographic characteristics. Methods: Cross-sectional study examining associations between demographic characteristics and completely responding depression-screening questions. Participants: “Healthy Minds Study” data, collected in a public University in February 2016, where 7,326 students participated. Results: women (AOR: 0.69; 95% CI =0.57–0.83) and gay/lesbian students (AOR: 0.24; 95% CI =0.10–0.60) had better complete response rates. Non-US (AOR: 1.46; 95% CI =1.03–2.07), black (AOR: 3.32; 95% CI =1.92–5.77), and Middle-Eastern students (AOR: 3.73; 95% CI =1.73–8.02) had lower complete response rates. Conclusions: Our study shows sex, gender, citizenship, and race categories have significant differences in complete response rates for the outcome. Our findings have several implications; including recognizing interventions for depression based on responders may not target those that tend to be “partial-responders”. Efforts in survey design, recruiting and completion of surveys should be maximized.     

Becoming the mother of a child with disabilities: a systematic literature review

The transition to motherhood starts early in pregnancy and is completed when the mother feels competent in caring for the infant. Becoming the mother of a child with disabilities is demanding as their needs are complex. The aim of the review was to appraise completed qualitative and quantitative reports on the challenges of mothers of children with disabilities regarding their own transition to motherhood. A review of the literature was carried out through, first, a computerized search strategy to identify relevant studies from selected databases and, second, quality appraisal and thematic analysis of selected studies. The transition to motherhood of children with disabilities takes place in the inside world at home, the outside world external to home and the ‘going-between’ world of travelling between the two worlds. The mothers are challenged at home to integrate basic infant care with technical care of their children. In the outside world they often struggled to ensure that their children got the necessary professional care. Travelling between their homes and healthcare services posed many problems.     

An Empirical Test of a Neo-Malthusian Theory of Fertility Change

Some neo-Malthusians regard fertility as being kept in check by scarcities and constraints and, conversely, as being raised by economic prosperity. Since out-migration to developed countries and the receipt of food aid from developed countries relax the constraints imposed by a country’s carrying capacity, both will have a positive effect on fertility rates in developing countries. Moreover, better economic prospects will also raise fertility, all other things equal. This article provides an empirical test of these hypotheses derived from a neo-Malthusian theory of fertility change. The results fail to confirm the theory and often contradict it.