A Note on "The Longitudinal Structure of Earnings Losses among Work-Limited Disabled Workers"

Charles (2003) examines the dynamic effects of disability, finding a small decline in earnings and hours following disability onset, even for those who have positive disability reports for each of the next ten years. These outcomes also rebound quickly after the onset of disability. In recent work, Meyer and Mok (2006), find a much larger loss in earnings and a greater decline in hours. Here we find large and persistent declines in earnings and hours, generally several times those reported in Charles (2003). The current findings were arrived at by two research teams working independently without sharing any computer code.