Invited Paper, Demography and Labour Economics Section

Second Russian Economic CongressSuzdal, 18 February 2013

Dr Judith ShapiroDepartment of Economics

LSEj.c.shapiro@lse.ac.uk

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The Disciplines of Demography and Economics: Can We and Should We Narrow the Gap?

Outline of key points• Meade, Brass, Glass (1960) goal not yet achieved:

Closer co-operation of demography and economics• Connected origins of demography and economics: • Graunt, Petty: London, science and Baconian empiricism

• Separate Disciplines as 19th Century Development • Economics, theory first; Demography, highly empirical

• 20th Century: Demography finds Sociology• Sociology and Economics: values first of incentives?

• 21st Century: As in 1960, need closer co-operation• New as key policy challenges: Migration, labour force• Little room for luxury of separate intellectual worlds

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John Graunt (1620-1674) Demography

William Petty (1623-1687) : Economics

Graunt’s Mortality Table: 1662

Demography highly empirical…

Economics has been different, is evolving:Colander 2005 [US data]

Very important Moderately UnimportantDon’t know

Other parallel problems:Demogaphers’ Period versus Cohort

• Analogy in Economics: Time Series and Cross Section• Time series and cross section may yield different results. • Good recent example: Womens’ status and the birth rate

• Time-series : direct relationship• Cross-section: inverse! [Ahn and Mira, 2002 + others]

• May have to use cross-section to estimate cohort. • Many demographic magnitudes not popularly understood

as cross-section estimates of cohort values: e.g: Total Fertility Rate, Life Expectancy

United for policy needs?

• Russia, 2013: Past crisis of mortality and fertility• Migration and the labour force move to centre stage• Neither discipline has priority here• Theory and empirical evidence both needed • Co-operation requires understanding each others’

traditions, borrowing fruitfully• Does not require or benefit from union • Partnership, joint publication: a giant step • Both disciplines, and policy, have much to gain