Abstract
I develop and demonstrate a simple formula for estimating age-specific event rates for a period from “before” and “after” cross sections. The general approach applies to a wide range of estimation problems in demography, the social sciences, and epidemiology. The method arises from the formal mathematics of unstable populations and is similar in spirit to “variable-r” methods. Unlike those methods, however, the new technique does not require specialized computer programming or iterative calculations, and event rates can be calculated directly from cross-sectional data in simple spreadsheets. The article includes a formal mathematical exposition of the method, simulation tests, and several examples.
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Earlier versions of this article were presented at the 2000 Southern Demographic Association meetings in New Orleans and at the 2001 annual meetings of the Population Association of America in Washington, DC. I thank Monica Boyd, Tom Bryan, Joe Potter, Ken Wachter, and an anonymous reviewer for their helpful comments and critiques.
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Schmertmann, C.P. A Simple method for estimating age-specific rates from sequential cross sections. Demography 39, 287–310 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1353/dem.2002.0018
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1353/dem.2002.0018