In: Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 2019, vol. 37, no. 4, p. 710-720
We propose a difference-in-differences approach for disentangling a total treatment effect within specific subpopulations into a direct effect and an indirect effect operating through a binary mediating variable. Random treatment assignment along with specific common trend and effect homogeneity assumptions identify the direct effects on the always and never takers, whose mediator is not...
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In: Journal of Labor Research, 2020, vol. 41, no. 1, p. 1-33
This paper investigates the sensitivity of average wage gap decompositions to methods resting on different assumptions regarding endogeneity of observed characteristics, sample selection into employment, and estimators’ functional form. Applying five distinct decomposition techniques to estimate the gender wage gap in the U.S. using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979,...
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(Working Papers SES ; 514)
Causal mediation analysis aims at disentangling a treatment effect into an indirect mechanism operating through an intermediate outcome or mediator, as well as the direct effect of the treatment on the outcome of interest. However, the evaluation of direct and indirect effects is frequently complicated by non-ignorable selection into the treatment and/or mediator, even after controlling for...
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In: Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, 2016, vol. 34, no. 1, p. 139-160
Using a comprehensive simulation study based on empirical data, this article investigates the finite sample properties of different classes of parametric and semiparametric stimators of (natural) direct and indirect causal effects used in mediation analysis under sequential conditional independence assumptions. The estimators are based on regression, inverse probability weighting, and...
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In: Journal of business & economic statistics, 2015, vol. 33, no. 2, p. 179-191
The decomposition of gender or ethnic wage gaps into explained and unexplained components (often with the aim to assess labor market discrimination) has been a major research agenda in empirical labor economics. This article demonstrates that conventional decompositions, no matter whether linear or nonparametric, are equivalent to assuming a (probably too) simple model of mediation (aimed at...
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(Working Papers SES ; 496)
This paper considers the evaluation of direct and indirect treatment effects, also known as mediation analysis, when outcomes are only observed for a subpopulation due to sample selection or outcome attrition. For identification, we combine sequential conditional independence assumptions on the assignment of the treatment and the mediator, i.e. the variable through which the indirect effect...
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