NBER Publications by Tracy A. Falba

We explore the impact on depressive symptoms of deviation in actual labor force behavior at age 62 from earlier expectations. Our sample of 4,241 observations is drawn from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS). We examine workers who were less than 62 years of age at the 1992 HRS baseline, and who had reached age 62 by our study endpoint, enabling comparison of actual labor force withdrawal with earlier expectations. Poisson regression were used to estimate the impact of expected full-time work status on depressive symptoms; regressions are estimated separately for those working fulltime at age 62 and those not working fulltime. We found significant effects on depression at age 62 both for full-time workers who expected not to be working full-time, and for participants not working full-t...

Occupation is discussed as a social determinant of health. Occupation has received little attention in this light in the economics literature. We examine occupation in a life-course framework and use measures of first-occupation, initial health, and mother’s education. We contend that first occupation is a choice made relatively early in life that affects health outcomes at later ages. We examine first-occupation for two reasons: 1) there is growing evidence that early determinants affect later health and occupation has received little attention in this regard and 2) first occupation is predetermined in analysis of later health, which helps to address the issue of potential simultaneity. Using data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) we estimate the impact of initial occupat...