Earnings Growth versus Measures of Income and Education for Predicting Mortality

A strong inverse relationship between mortality and socioeconomic statusThis paper begins an exploration to determine whether earnings growth, as a measure of the propensity to invest in human capital, is a valuable variable for predicting mortality. To insure its robustness and general applicability to ongoing Social Security models, the usefulness of earnings growth as a predictor of mortality will be explored in multiple time periods. This paper begins that process by reporting preliminary results for an early time period using the 1973 CPS-SSA-IRS Exact Match file. In addition to presenting preliminary results, the paper also describes how data challenges associated with the pre-1978 administrative record data on earnings and mortality are met.Social Security Administrationhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90024/1/wp257.pd