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Example Task

The document outlines two tasks: a Labor Market Analysis Task and a Data Manipulation Task. The Labor Market Analysis requires analyzing U.S. Current Population Survey data to identify trends in wages and labor force participation since 1976, while the Data Manipulation Task involves processing data from a Medicare Advantage file with no time limit. Both tasks emphasize the importance of clear communication and effective data presentation over complex methodologies.

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lacetof805
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81 views1 page

Example Task

The document outlines two tasks: a Labor Market Analysis Task and a Data Manipulation Task. The Labor Market Analysis requires analyzing U.S. Current Population Survey data to identify trends in wages and labor force participation since 1976, while the Data Manipulation Task involves processing data from a Medicare Advantage file with no time limit. Both tasks emphasize the importance of clear communication and effective data presentation over complex methodologies.

Uploaded by

lacetof805
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Tasks Overview

Sample Predoc Data Task


Access all .zip files referenced below here

1. Labor Market Analysis Task


• Time: Spend no more than 5 hours on this task
• File: cps wages LFP.zip contains a stata .dta file (and duplicate .csv) from the
U.S. Current Population Survey since 1976.1 It provides individual-level data on
year, state, month, survey weight, demographic characteristics, and labor market
outcomes.
• Goal: We’d like you to use these data to produce your best answer to the following
question: how have hourly wages (“wage”) and labor force participation (“lfp”)
evolved for skilled and unskilled workers since 1976?
(a) Please summarize the key trends for wages and labor force participation.
(b) Among men older than age 25, which groups of people have had the biggest
changes in labor force participation?
(c) What factors do you think are driving these patterns? What evidence might
you want to assemble to test these hypotheses if you were to investigate them
further?
• Output:
(a) Please provide a short note in .pdf format that concisely answers these ques-
tions. Please be sure to include a few graphs and/or tables to support your
conclusions.
(b) Please provide the code that you used to produce these figures and/or tables.
• Note: You should feel free to use whatever techniques you want. The goal here is
not to show off hi-tech econometrics, but rather to show us how you think about
data. Sometimes something as simple as a graph can do more for an argument
than all the estimators in the world.
2. Data Manipulation Task
• Time: No limit; complete as quickly as you can without sacrificing quality (e.g.,
it is worth spending 5 minutes “commenting” your code so we can understand it.)
• File: Medicare Advantage.zip
– The zip archive Medicare Advantage.zip contains a document called Medicare
Advantage Instructions.pdf that describes the task in detail. You will need to
take the data in scp-1205.csv and perform some simple manipulations. You
are welcome to use whatever tool you like for this.
1
Extracted from https://cps.ipums.org/cps/.

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