Volume 17, Number 3 (Summer) 1982
Rosen, Sherwin, and Paul Taubman. 1982. "Changes in Life-Cycle Earnings: What Do Social Security Data Show?" Journal of Human Resources 17(3):321-338.
A matched sample of Social Security and Current Population Survey records is used to examine life-cycle earnings patterns of white males over the 1951-1976 period. Estimated direct effects of schooling and experience compare well with other studies, but interaction effects with cohort do not. Younger cohorts exhibit smaller marginal returns to schooling and larger marginal returns to experience, but differences between cohorts are very small. When demographic factors, namely, veteran status, are controlled, direct cohort effects are linear in these data and show no tendency to vary with cohort size.
The authors are, respectively, Professor of Economics, University of
Chicago, and Professor of Economics, University of Pennsylvania. Both are
Research Associates with NBER.
* This research was supported by a grant from NIA. Chris Flinn provided able
research assistance.
© 2003 by the Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System
US ISSN 0022-166X