Volume 30, Number 2 (Spring) 1995
Evans, David S., and Linda S. Leighton. 1995. "Retrospective Bias in the Displaced Worker Surveys." Journal of Human Resources 30(2):386-396.
The Displaced Worker Survey of the U.S. Bureau of labor Statistics understates the number of workers displaced over the preceding five years covered by the survey by approximately one-third. The bias results from from the fact that respondents' memory of displacement erodes over time. Memory loss is not randomly distributed across demographic groups, thereby making analyses based on these survey data suspect. The note reports memory-loss adjusted estimates of the number of displaced workers between 1979 and 1989 based on Displaced Worker Surveys for 1984, 1986, 1988, and 1990.
David S. Evan is a researcher for National Economic Research Associates, Inc. Linda S. Leighton is a professor of economics at Fordham University. The authors would like to thank Christopher Erath and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. The data used in this article can be obtained beginning August 1995 through August 1998 from David S. Evans, National Economic Research Associates, Inc., One Main Street, Cambridge, MA 02142.
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