Essays in Applied Microeconomics and Numerical Optimization

Abstract

This thesis combines three self-contained research studies. In the first chapter, we use empirical data to study the dynamics of physical and cognitive capacities during later stages of life within. <br> Concerning a related topic, but in a different setting, the second chapter also uses empirical data to study functional outcomes in the later stages of life, with a particular aim of understanding how environmental factors interact with intrinsic capacities to determine those outcomes. In the third chapter, we propose an optimization algorithm tailored to the needs of economists who deal with “hard” optimization problems when fitting structural models to empirical data.