Education, homogamy and living standard over the life course: a microsimulation approach

This article assesses the impact of demographic events (union formation and childbirth) on individual living standard; the heterogeneity across education levels and gender is estimated taking into account educational homogamy. We aim at producing a dynamic analysis of this influence over the life-course that goes beyond the standard cross-section approach of child-cost estimates and the use of equivalence scale (like the OECD equivalence-scale). More specifically, we consider the timing of demographic events, and of the enrolment in formal education as well as wage profiles of the individual and his/her partner. Such an analysis theoretically requires a long panel dataset, which is unfortunately not available for France. For this reason, our research strategy consists in simulating the career and family formation of a given cohort, using microsimulation techniques. We simulate union formation and childbirth, using an innovative dynamic model that simulates the diversity of careers for a given generation and that takes into account the heterogeneity of the initial education level. This approach helps us to simulate the age of union, mate matching function, age of childbirth in a way that is extensively presented in the paper.