The definition of labor force participation in the standard labor supply model stands in sharp contrast to that used in compiling the labor force statistics. In standard labor supply models, only those supplying positive hours of work are considered to be labor force participants. On the other...

This mix of state and private pension provision in the United Kingdom provides a rare degree of variation in pension incentives for retirement. Using a sample of individuals from the UK Retirement Survey, the paper models the probability of retirement in terms of the incentives underlying the...

This paper examines the application of count data models to firm level panel data on technological innovations. The model the authors propose exhibits dynamic feedback and unobserved heterogeneity. We develop a fixed effects estimator that generalizes the standard Poisson and negative binomial...

Friedman's book on the consumption function is one of the great works of Economics demonstrating how the interplay between theoretical ideas and data analysis can lead to major policy implications. We present a short review of Friedman's permanent income hypothesis, the origins of the idea and...

The exact measurement of the welfare costs of tax and price reform requires a detailed knowledge of individual preferences. Typically, first-order approximations of welfare costs are calculated avoiding detailed knowledge of substitution effects. The authors derive second-order approximations...

This paper studies the paths from inequality in earnings to inequality in household consumption. We show that careful study of the evolution of the variances and covariances of earnings and consumption within cohorts across time can identify permanent and transitory shocks. We present an...

This survey is designed to emphasize the relationship between empirical a nd theoretical considerations in the analysis of consumer behavior. A lthough it focuses primarily on analysis at the individual or micro l evel, it tries, where possible, to draw implications for the estimati on of...