Publications:
- The Statistical Review of World Energy [Manuscript]
Recurrent yearly project where we collect and compile a complete survey of world energy production, consumption and trade.
- The Intergenerational Mobility of White Working Class Boys: A Quantitative Analysis' [Manuscript]
This study examines the relative intergenerational economic mobility of British white working class boys using data provided by the Understanding Society Survey from 2009 to 2014 for the UK. We measure intergenerational mobility using the Hope-Goldthorpe occupational scale and capture mobility via descriptive data, mobility matrices and by estimating coefficients for intergenerational mobility. We find that white working class boys perform the poorest in terms of educational attainment with a quarter having no qualifications and the lowest proportion of 17% having the highest qualifications. We also find that white working class boys outperform the ethnic working class in terms of income and this we refer to as the "white working class paradox". Through a set of mobility matrices, we find an overall intergenerational persistence rate of just under 28% with considerably higher persistence for those whose fathers were in managerial and professional occupations. Upward mobility dominates downward mobility so that the share in the higher ranked occupations becomes higher over time. White working class boys have the lowest upward mobility (33%) and the second highest downward mobility (41%) relative to the average male. Ethnic working class boys exhibit the lowest persistence among all groups but their greater mobility is likely to be downward (20%). Our regression estimates do indicate overall upward mobility in the sample with the non-working class groups displaying higher upward social mobility with the worst performing group being the ethnic working class and not the white working class. Both parental background and educational qualifications boost upward mobility although these effects are higher for the non-working class.
- 'Survival Analysis: Exploring the dropout motives in a panel of Peruvian children, using the Young Lives program dataset' [Manuscript]
Our thesis explores the dropout motives of a panel of Peruvian children, provided by the Young Lives program. Boyden (April 2014). We used survival analysis with both, a non-parametric estimation (Kaplan-Meier survival estimates) and a semi-parametric estimation (Cox proportional hazards (PH) model). Our results suggest that the child’s initial conditions are relevant determinants of the drop out decision. Also, we found evidence to support the importance of the wealth level, the location of the household and the sex of the caregiver, for the drop out decision. We believe that further research is required to refine the size of the effects and this can be achieved by the inclusion of the fourth round of data and the use of parametric models to explore the effect of the covariates that did not meet the proportionality assumption required by the Cox PH model.
Working papers:
- Quantifying Socioeconomic Inequality in Childhood Obesity [Strathclyde DP | SSRN ] submitted
We use longitudinal data on 11,000 UK-born children to examine the relationship between parental weight and income and children's overweight across childhood. We find that children are three times as likely to be overweight or obese at 14 if they have an obese parent. Irrespective of their parents' weight, children in the poorest 20% of families are twice as likely to be overweight or obese. These relationships persist through childhood, strengthen over time, and are impervious to observed behavioural differences between groups. This suggests that differences in shared social and economic circumstances across childhood lead to the emergence of stark inequality in childhood obesity across the income distribution by age 14.
- A Dynamic Model of Educational Achievement and Aspirations as Reference Points
We aim to model educational achievement, driven by choices of educational aspirations over time. This paper follows previous models in the behavioural economics literature, that treat aspirations as a reference point. The model has three main components, aspirations, effort and beliefs. Our model looks at what happens to a student's educational aspirations upon learning a noisy signal about their ability. This reaction will partially determine their overall utility based on two effects, which we term, the `aspiration effect' and the `achievement effect'. We present a solution for the choice of optimal effort in the second period and we look at the effect of information on the optimal choice. We conclude by providing policy advice.
Work in Progress (preliminary titles):
- Predicting Obesity in Adults using Early Life Data with the Random Forests Classifier
- The Effects of Longer Secondary School Days on Parents’ Labour Market Outcomes: Evidence from the Jornada Escolar Completa Reform in Peru