Using a rich longitudinal data set from birth, we explore three estimation issues related to academic performance analysis. Our paper primarily examines the effect of omitting childhood and teenage characteristics (childhood ability, parental resources at different times and peer effects), which...

This research uses the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey to investigate the impacts of health on labour force status of older working-age Australian men. We estimate a model that exploits the longitudinal nature of the data and takes the correlation between the...

This paper describes microsimulation modelling in non-technical terms and explains what can be achieved with microsimulation modelling in general, and the Melbourne Institute Tax and Transfer Simulator (MITTS) in particular. The focus is on behavioural microsimulation modelling, which takes...

Based on labour supply parameter estimates and childcare demand parameters for the Australian population in 2002, this paper illustrates how an extended childcare subsidy proposed by the Taskforce on Care Costs in October 2006 can be evaluated using a microsimulation model. First, the cost to...

This is an introduction to the papers in this special issue on policy simulations discussing a variety of simulation models. Simulation modelling has become a powerful tool to analyse hypothetical and actual policy changes. This issue contains analyses based on both macro- and micro-level data....