Seminar

Estimation of a Life-Cycle Model with Human Capital, Labor Supply and Retirement

Christopher Taber (University of Wisconsin - Madison)

March 17, 2015, 15:30–17:00

Room MS 001

Econometrics and Empirical Economics Seminar

Abstract

We develop and estimate a life-cycle model in which individuals make decisions about consumption, human capital investment, and labor supply. Retirement arises endogenously as part of the labor supply decision. The model allows for both an endogenous wage process through human capital investment (which is typically assumed exogenous in the retirement literature) and an endogenous retirement decision (which is typically assumed exogenous in the human capital literature). We estimate the model using the Method of Simulated Moments to match the life-cycle profiles of wages and hours from the SIPP data. The model replicates the main features of the data—in particular the large increase in wages and small increase in labor supply at the beginning of the life-cycle as well as the small decrease in wages but large decrease in labor supply at the end of the life cycle. We also estimate versions of the model in which human capital is completely exogenous and in which human capital is exogenous conditional on work (learning-by-doing). The endogenous human capital model fits the data the best.