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Re-examining Regional Income Convergence: A Distributional Approach
February 2023
Working Paper Number:
CES-23-05
We re-examine recent trends in regional income convergence, considering the full distribution of income rather than focusing on the mean. Measuring similarity by comparing each percentile of state
distributions to the corresponding percentile of the national distribution, we find that state incomes have become less similar (i.e. they have diverged) within the top 20 percent of the income distribution since 1969. The top percentile alone accounts for more than half of aggregate divergence across states over this period by our measure, and the top five percentiles combine to account for 93 percent. Divergence in top incomes across states appears to be driven largely by changes in top incomes among White people, while top incomes among Black people have experienced relatively little divergence.
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National Experimental Wellbeing Statistics - Version 1
February 2023
Working Paper Number:
CES-23-04
This is the U.S. Census Bureau's first release of the National Experimental Wellbeing Statistics (NEWS) project. The NEWS project aims to produce the best possible estimates of income and poverty given all available survey and administrative data. We link survey, decennial census, administrative, and third-party data to address measurement error in income and poverty statistics. We estimate improved (pre-tax money) income and poverty statistics for 2018 by addressing several possible sources of bias documented in prior research. We address biases from 1) unit nonresponse through improved weights, 2) missing income information in both survey and administrative data through improved imputation, and 3) misreporting by combining or replacing survey responses with administrative information. Reducing survey error substantially affects key measures of well-being: We estimate median household income is 6.3 percent higher than in survey estimates, and poverty is 1.1 percentage points lower. These changes are driven by subpopulations for which survey error is particularly relevant. For house holders aged 65 and over, median household income is 27.3 percent higher and poverty is 3.3 percentage points lower than in survey estimates. We do not find a significant impact on median household income for householders under 65 or on child poverty. Finally, we discuss plans for future releases: addressing other potential sources of bias, releasing additional years of statistics, extending the income concepts measured, and including smaller geographies such as state and county.
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The Long-run Effects of the 1930s Redlining Maps on Children
December 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-56
We estimate the long-run effects of the 1930s Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) redlining maps by linking children in the full count 1940 Census to 1) the universe of IRS tax data in 1974 and 1979 and 2) the long form 2000 Census. We use two identification strategies to estimate the potential long-run effects of differential access to credit along HOLC boundaries. The first strategy compares cross-boundary differences along HOLC boundaries to a comparison group of boundaries that had statistically similar pre-existing differences as the actual boundaries. A second approach only uses boundaries that were least likely to have been chosen by the HOLC based on our statistical model. We find that children living on the lower-graded side of HOLC boundaries had significantly lower levels of educational attainment, reduced income in adulthood, and lived in neighborhoods during adulthood characterized by lower educational attainment, higher poverty rates, and higher rates of single-headed households.
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Maternal and Infant Health Inequality: New Evidence from Linked Administrative Data
November 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-55
We use linked administrative data that combines the universe of California birth records, hospitalizations, and death records with parental income from Internal Revenue Service tax records and the Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics file to provide novel evidence on economic inequality in infant and maternal health. We find that birth outcomes vary nonmonotonically with parental income, and that children of parents in the top ventile of the income distribution have higher rates of low birth weight and preterm birth than those in the bottom ventile. However, unlike birth outcomes, infant mortality varies monotonically with income, and infants of parents in the top ventile of the income distribution---who have the worst birth outcomes---have a death rate that is half that of infants of parents in the bottom ventile. When studying maternal health, we find a similar pattern of non-monotonicity between income and severe maternal morbidity, and a monotonic and decreasing relationship between income and maternal mortality. At the same time, these disparities by parental income are small when compared to racial disparities, and we observe virtually no convergence in health outcomes across racial and ethnic groups as income rises. Indeed, infant and maternal health in Black families at the top of the income distribution is markedly worse than that of white families at the bottom of the income distribution. Lastly, we benchmark the health gradients in California to those in Sweden, finding that infant and maternal health is worse in California than in Sweden for most outcomes throughout the entire income distribution.
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LEHD Snapshot Documentation, Release S2021_R2022Q4
November 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-51
The Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) data at the U.S. Census Bureau is a quarterly database of linked employer-employee data covering over 95% of employment in the United States. These data are used to produce a number of public-use tabulations and tools, including the Quarterly Workforce Indicators (QWI), LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES), Job-to-Job Flows (J2J), and Post-Secondary Employment Outcomes (PSEO) data products. Researchers on approved projects may also access the underlying LEHD microdata directly, in the form of the LEHD Snapshot restricted-use data product. This document provides a detailed overview of the LEHD Snapshot as of release S2021_R2022Q4, including user guidance, variable codebooks, and an overview of the approvals needed to obtain access. Updates to the documentation for this and future snapshot releases will be made available in HTML format on the LEHD website.
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Measuring the Characteristics and Employment Dynamics of U.S. Inventors
September 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-43
Innovation is a key driver of long run economic growth. Studying innovation requires a clear view of the characteristics and behavior of the individuals that create new ideas. A general lack of rich, large-scale data has constrained such analyses. We address this by introducing a new dataset linking patent inventors to survey, census, and administrative microdata at the U.S. Census Bureau. We use this data to provide a first look at the demographic characteristics, employer characteristics, earnings, and employment dynamics of inventors. These linkages, which will be available to researchers with approved access, dramatically increases the scope of what can be learned about inventors and innovative activity.
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The Radius of Economic Opportunity: Evidence from Migration and Local Labor Markets
July 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-27
We examine the geographic incidence of local labor market growth across locations of childhood residence. We ask: when wages grow in a given US labor market, do the benefits flow to individuals growing up in nearby or distant locations? We begin by constructing new statistics on migration rates across labor markets between childhood and young adulthood. This migration matrix shows 80% of young adults migrate less than 100 miles from where they grew up. 90% migrate less than 500 miles. Migration distances are shorter for Black and Hispanic individuals and for those from low income families. These migration patterns provide information on the first order geographic incidence of local wage growth. Next, we explore the responsiveness of location choices to economic shocks. Using geographic variation induced by the recovery from the Great Recession, we estimate the elasticity of migration with respect to increases in local labor market wage growth. We develop and implement a novel test for validating whether our identifying wage variation is driven by changes in labor market opportunities rather than changes in worker composition due to sorting. We find that higher wages lead to increased in-migration, decreased out-migration and a partial capitalization of wage increases into local prices. Our results imply that for a 2 rank point increase in annual wages (approximately $1600) in a given commuting zone (CZ), approximately 99% of wage gains flow to those who would have resided in the CZ in the absence of the wage change. The geographically concentrated nature of most migration and the small magnitude of these migration elasticities suggest that the incidence of labor market conditions across childhood residences is highly local. For many individuals, the 'radius of economic opportunity' is quite narrow.
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Age, Sex, and Racial/Ethnic Disparities and Temporal-Spatial Variation in
Excess All-Cause Mortality During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Evidence from Linked Administrative and Census Bureau Data
May 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-18
Research on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States has highlighted substantial racial/ethnic disparities in excess mortality, but reports often differ in the details with respect to the size of these disparities. We suggest that these inconsistencies stem from differences in the temporal scope and measurement of race/ethnicity in existing data. We address these issues using death records for 2010 through 2021 from the Social Security Administration, covering the universe of individuals ever issued a Social Security Number, linked to race/ethnicity responses from the decennial census and American Community Survey. We use these data to (1) estimate excess all-cause mortality at the national level and for age-, sex-, and race/ethnicity-specific subgroups, (2) examine racial/ethnic variation in excess mortality over the course of the pandemic, and (3) explore whether and how racial/ethnic mortality disparities vary across states.
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The impact of manufacturing credentials on earnings and the probability of employment
May 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-15
This paper examines the labor market returns to earning industry-certified credentials in the manufacturing sector. Specifically, we are interested in estimating the impact of a manufacturing credential on wages, probability of employment, and probability of employment specifically in the manufacturing sector post credential attainment. We link students who earned manufacturing credentials to their enrollment and completion records, and then further link them to their IRS tax records for earnings and employment (Form W2 and 1040) and to the American Community Survey and decennial census for demographic information. We present earnings trajectories for workers with credentials by type of credential, industry of employment, age, race and ethnicity, gender, and state. To obtain a more causal estimate of the impact of a credential on earnings, we implement a coarsened exact matching strategy to compare outcomes between otherwise similar people with and without a manufacturing credential. We find that the attainment of a manufacturing industry credential is associated with higher earnings and a higher likelihood of labor market participation when we compare attainers to a group of non-attainers who are otherwise similar.
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Mortality in a Multi-State Cohort of Former State Prisoners, 2010-2015
February 2022
Working Paper Number:
CES-22-06
Previous studies report that individuals who have been imprisoned have higher mortality rates than their demographic counterparts in the general population, particularly non-Hispanic white former prisoners. Most of these studies have been based on a single state's prison system, and the extent to which their findings can be generalized has not been established. In this study we explore the role that race/Hispanic origin, other demographic characteristics, and custodial/ criminal history factors have on post-release mortality, including on the timing of deaths. We also assess whether conditional release to community supervision or reimprisonment may explain the higher post-release mortality found among non-Hispanic whites. In the second part of the analysis, we estimate standardized mortality ratios (SMRs) by sex, age group, and race/Hispanic origin using as reference the U.S. general population. The data come from state prison releases from the Bureau of Justice Statistics' (BJS) National Corrections Reporting Program (NCRP). The NCRP records were linked to the Census Numident to identify deaths occurring within five years from prison release. We also linked NCRP records to previous decennial censuses and survey responses to obtain self-reported race and Hispanic origin if available. We found that non-Hispanic white former prisoners were more likely to die within five years after prison release and more likely to die in the initial weeks after release compared to racial minorities and Hispanics. Reimprisonment, age at release, and a history of multiple prison terms had a similar influence on the odds of dying across all race/Hispanic origin groups. Other factors, such as the type of release and the duration of the last term in prison, were associated with higher risks of mortality for some groups but not for others.
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