LifeSim: a lifecourse dynamic microsimulation model of the millennium birth cohort in England

Ieva Skarda, Miqdad Asaria and Richard Cookson

LSE Research Online Documents on Economics from London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library

Abstract: We present a dynamic microsimulation model for childhood policy analysis that models developmental, economic, social and health outcomes from birth to death for each child in the Millennium Birth Cohort (MCS) in England, together with public costs and a summary wellbeing measure. The model is a discrete event simulation in discrete time (annual periods), implemented in R, which progresses 100,000 individuals through each year of their lives from birth in the year 2000 to death. From age 0 to 18 the model draws observational data from the MCS, with explicit modelling of only a few derived outcomes (mental health, conduct disorder, mortality, health-related quality of life, public costs and a general wellbeing metric). During adulthood, all outcomes are modelled dynamically using explicit networks of stochastic process equations, with separate networks for working age and retirement. Our equations are parameterised using effect estimates from existing studies combined with target outcome levels from up-to-date administrative and survey data. We present our baseline projections and a simple validation check against external data from the British Cohort Study 1970 and Understanding Society survey.

Keywords: childhood; conduct problems; inequality; lifecourse; policy evaluation; simulation; skills; well-being (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N0 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 41 pages
Date: 2021-10-25
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cmp and nep-eur
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Published in International Journal of Microsimulation, 25, October, 2021, 14(1), pp. 2 - 42

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Related works:
Journal Article: LifeSim: A Lifecourse Dynamic Microsimulation Model of the Millennium Birth Cohort in England (2021)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ehl:lserod:112493

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