IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bpj/jecome/v6y2017i1p20n4.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Competing Risks Copula Models for Unemployment Duration: An Application to a German Hartz Reform

Author

Listed:
  • Lo Simon M.S.

    (Lingnan University, Rm 218, Ho Sin Hang Building, Lingnan University, Hong Kong)

  • Stephan Gesine

    (Institute for Employment Research (IAB) and Friedrich-Alexander-Universitaet Erlangen Nuernberg (FAU), Regensburger Str. 104, 90478 Nuremberg, Germany)

  • Wilke Ralf A.

    (Copenhagen Business School, Department of Economics, Porcelaenshaven 16A, 2000 Frederiksberg, Denmark)

Abstract

The copula graphic estimator (CGE) for competing risks models has received little attention in empirical research, despite having been developed into a comprehensive research method. In this paper, we bridge the gap between theoretical developments and applied research by considering a general class of competing risks copula models, which nests popular models such as the Cox proportional hazards model, the semiparametric multivariate mixed proportional hazards model (MMPHM), and the CGE as special cases. Analyzing the effects of a German Hartz reform on unemployment duration, we illustrate that the CGE imposes fewer restrictions on partial covariate effects than standard methods do. Differences are less evident when a more flexible difference-in-differences estimator is applied. It is also found that the MMPHM estimates react more strongly to the choice of the copula than the CGE in terms of the shape of the treatment effect function over time. Thus, the MMPHM produces less robust results in our application.

Suggested Citation

  • Lo Simon M.S. & Stephan Gesine & Wilke Ralf A., 2017. "Competing Risks Copula Models for Unemployment Duration: An Application to a German Hartz Reform," Journal of Econometric Methods, De Gruyter, vol. 6(1), pages 1-20, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bpj:jecome:v:6:y:2017:i:1:p:20:n:4
    DOI: 10.1515/jem-2015-0005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1515/jem-2015-0005
    Download Restriction: For access to full text, subscription to the journal or payment for the individual article is required.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1515/jem-2015-0005?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marco Caliendo & Konstantinos Tatsiramos & Arne Uhlendorff, 2013. "Benefit Duration, Unemployment Duration And Job Match Quality: A Regression‐Discontinuity Approach," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 28(4), pages 604-627, June.
    2. Lee, Sokbae & Wilke, Ralf A., 2009. "Reform of Unemployment Compensation in Germany: A Nonparametric Bounds Analysis Using Register Data," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 27(2), pages 193-205.
    3. Rivest, Louis-Paul & Wells, Martin T., 2001. "A Martingale Approach to the Copula-Graphic Estimator for the Survival Function under Dependent Censoring," Journal of Multivariate Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 79(1), pages 138-155, October.
    4. Johannes F. Schmieder & Till von Wachter & Stefan Bender, 2012. "The Effects of Extended Unemployment Insurance Over the Business Cycle: Evidence from Regression Discontinuity Estimates Over 20 Years," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 127(2), pages 701-752.
    5. Stephan Dlugosz & Gesine Stephan & Ralf A. Wilke, 2014. "Fixing the Leak: Unemployment Incidence before and after a Major Reform of Unemployment Benefits in Germany," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 15(3), pages 329-352, August.
    6. Jerry Hausman & Tiemen Woutersen, 2014. "Estimating the Derivative Function and Counterfactuals in Duration Models with Heterogeneity," Econometric Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(5-6), pages 472-496, August.
    7. Lo Simon M.S. & Wilke Ralf A., 2014. "A Regression Model for the Copula-Graphic Estimator," Journal of Econometric Methods, De Gruyter, vol. 3(1), pages 21-46, January.
    8. Johannes F. Schmieder† & Till von Wachter & Stefan Bender, 2011. "The Effects Of Extended Unemployment Insurance Over The Business Cycle: Evidence From Regression Discontinuity Estimates Over Twenty Years," Boston University - Department of Economics - Working Papers Series WP2011-063, Boston University - Department of Economics.
    9. Melanie Arntz & Simon Lo & Ralf Wilke, 2014. "Bounds analysis of competing risks: a non-parametric evaluation of the effect of unemployment benefits on migration," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 46(1), pages 199-228, February.
    10. Baker, Michael & Melino, Angelo, 2000. "Duration dependence and nonparametric heterogeneity: A Monte Carlo study," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 96(2), pages 357-393, June.
    11. Han, Aaron & Hausman, Jerry A, 1990. "Flexible Parametric Estimation of Duration and Competing Risk Models," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 5(1), pages 1-28, January-M.
    12. Jan C. van Ours & Milan Vodopivec, 2006. "How Shortening the Potential Duration of Unemployment Benefits Affects the Duration of Unemployment: Evidence from a Natural Experiment," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 24(2), pages 351-378, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Regina T. Riphahn & Rebecca Schrader, 2017. "Institutional reforms and an incredible rise in old age employment," Working Papers 169, Bavarian Graduate Program in Economics (BGPE).
    2. Inna Petrunyk & Christian Pfeifer, 2022. "Diverse effects of shorter potential unemployment benefit duration on labor market outcomes in Germany," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 36(3), pages 367-388, September.
    3. Lo, Simon M.S. & Shi, Shuolin & Wilke, Ralf A., 2025. "A copula duration model with dependent states and spells," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 204(C).
    4. Inna Petrunyk & Christian Pfeifer, 2018. "Shortening the potential duration of unemployment benefits and labor market outcomes: Evidence from a natural experiment in Germany," Working Paper Series in Economics 377, University of Lüneburg, Institute of Economics.
    5. Lo, Simon M.S. & Mammen, Enno & Wilke, Ralf A., 2020. "A nested copula duration model for competing risks with multiple spells," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    6. Lo, Simon M.S. & Wilke, Ralf A. & Emura, Takeshi, 2024. "A semiparametric model for the cause-specific hazard under risk proportionality," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jessen, Jonas & Jessen, Robin & Galecka-Burdziak, Ewa & Góra, Marek & Kluve, Jochen, 2023. "The Micro and Macro Effects of Changes in the Potential Benefit Duration," IZA Discussion Papers 15978, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Albanese, Andrea & Picchio, Matteo & Ghirelli, Corinna, 2020. "Timed to Say Goodbye: Does Unemployment Benefit Eligibility Affect Worker Layoffs?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    3. Stefano Della & Jörg Heining & Johannes F Schmieder & Simon Trenkle, 2023. "Evidence on Job Search Models from a Survey of Unemployed Workers in Germany," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 137(2), pages 1181-1232.
    4. Xu, Ke-Li, 2018. "A semi-nonparametric estimator of regression discontinuity design with discrete duration outcomes," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 206(1), pages 258-278.
    5. Inna Petrunyk & Christian Pfeifer, 2018. "Shortening the potential duration of unemployment benefits and labor market outcomes: Evidence from a natural experiment in Germany," Working Paper Series in Economics 377, University of Lüneburg, Institute of Economics.
    6. Konstantinos Tatsiramos & Jan C. Ours, 2014. "Labor Market Effects Of Unemployment Insurance Design," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 284-311, April.
    7. Kyyrä, Tomi & Pesola, Hanna, 2017. "Estimating the effects of potential benefit duration without variation in the maximum duration of unemployment benefits," Working Papers 87, VATT Institute for Economic Research.
    8. Lo, Simon M.S. & Stephan, Gesine & Wilke, Ralf, 2012. "Estimating the Latent Effect of Unemployment Benefits on Unemployment Duration," IZA Discussion Papers 6650, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    9. Le Barbanchon, Thomas, 2016. "The effect of the potential duration of unemployment benefits on unemployment exits to work and match quality in France," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 16-29.
    10. Kyyrä, Tomi & Pesola, Hanna, 2020. "The effects of unemployment benefit duration: Evidence from residual benefit duration," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    11. Regina T. Riphahn & Rebecca Schrader, 2017. "Institutional reforms and an incredible rise in old age employment," Working Papers 169, Bavarian Graduate Program in Economics (BGPE).
    12. Martín-Román, Ángel L., 2022. "Beyond the added-worker and the discouraged-worker effects: the entitled-worker effect," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 110(C).
    13. Ignacio Moral-Arce & Javier Martín-Román & Ángel L. Martín-Román, 2019. "Cessation of Activity Benefit for Spanish Self-employed Workers: A Heterogeneous Impact Evaluation," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 231(4), pages 41-79, December.
    14. de Groot, Nynke & van der Klaauw, Bas, 2019. "The effects of reducing the entitlement period to unemployment insurance benefits," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 195-208.
    15. Lechthaler, Wolfgang & Ring, Patrick, 2021. "Labor force participation, job search effort and unemployment insurance in the laboratory," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 189(C), pages 748-778.
    16. Bruno Decreuse & Guillaume Wilemme, 2025. "Age Discontinuity And Nonemployment Benefit Policy Evaluation Through The Lens Of Job Search Theory," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 66(1), pages 259-286, February.
    17. Bruno Coquet, 2017. "Les allocations chômage devraient-elles être dégressives ?," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03457573, HAL.
    18. Regis Barnichon & Yanos Zylberberg, 2022. "A Menu of Insurance Contracts for the Unemployed," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 89(1), pages 118-141.
    19. Arni, Patrick & Liu, Xingfei, 2016. "On or Off – Are Treatment Effects of Policy Changes Symmetric? Evidence from Unemployment Insurance Reform with Incomplete Information," VfS Annual Conference 2016 (Augsburg): Demographic Change 145519, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    20. repec:spo:wpmain:info:hdl:2441/2vagho9cns9668gqt9f4q5v8rg is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Arni, Patrick & Liu, Xingfei, 2020. "The Role of Incomplete Information in Shaping Policy Effects: Evidence from Unemployment Insurance," VfS Annual Conference 2020 (Virtual Conference): Gender Economics 224629, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • C34 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Truncated and Censored Models; Switching Regression Models
    • C41 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - Duration Analysis; Optimal Timing Strategies
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bpj:jecome:v:6:y:2017:i:1:p:20:n:4. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Peter Golla (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.degruyterbrill.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.