LCS: Lee-Carter model

In demofit: Parametric Mortality Curve Fitting and Mortality Forecasting Tools

Lee-Carter model

Description

Fits and forecasts mortality rates using Lee-Carter model.

Usage

LCS(
  x,
  M,
  curve = c("gompertz", "makeham", "oppermann", "thiele", "wittsteinbumsted", "perks",
    "weibull", "vandermaen", "beard", "heligmanpollard", "rogersplanck", "siler",
    "martinelle", "thatcher", "gompertz2", "makeham2", "oppermann2", "thiele2",
    "wittsteinbumsted2", "perks2", "weibull2", "vandermaen2", "beard2",
    "heligmanpollard2", "rogersplanck2", "siler2", "martinelle2", "thatcher2"),
  h = 10,
  jumpoff = 1
)

Arguments

x	vector of ages.
M	matrix of mortality rates (rows as years and columns as ages).
curve	name of mortality curve for smoothing forecasted mortality rates (including gompertz, makeham, oppermann, thiele, wittsteinbumsted, perks, weibull, vandermaen, beard, heligmanpollard, rogersplanck, siler, martinelle, thatcher, gompertz2, makeham2, oppermann2, thiele2, wittsteinbumsted2, perks2, weibull2, vandermaen2, beard2, heligmanpollard2, rogersplanck2, siler2, martinelle2, thatcher2, where first 14 curves' parameters are unconstrained and last 14 curves' parameters are generally restricted to be positive).
h	forecast horizon (default = 10).
jumpoff	if 1, forecasts are based on estimated parameters only; if 2, forecasts are anchored to observed mortality rates in final year (default = 1).

Details

The Lee-Carter (LC) model is specified as

ln(m_{x,t}) = \alpha_x + \beta_x \kappa_t + \epsilon_{x,t}.

The model is estimated by singular value decomposition and is forecasted by ARIMA applied to \kappa_t. Constraints include sum of \beta_x is one and sum of \kappa_t is zero. It can be applied to whole age range.

Value

An object of class LCS with associated S3 methods coef, forecast, plot, and residuals.

References

Lee, R.D. and Carter, L.R. (1992). Modeling and forecasting U.S. mortality. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 87(419), 659-671.

Examples

x <- 60:89
a <- c(-4.8499,-4.7676,-4.6719,-4.5722,-4.4847,-4.3841,-4.2813,-4.1863,-4.0861,-3.9962,
-3.8885,-3.7896,-3.6853,-3.5737,-3.4728,-3.3718,-3.2586,-3.1474,-3.0371,-2.9206,
-2.7998,-2.6845,-2.5653,-2.4581,-2.3367,-2.2159,-2.1017,-1.9941,-1.8821, -1.7697)
b <- c(0.0283,0.0321,0.0335,0.0336,0.0341,0.0358,0.0368,0.0403,0.0392,0.0395,
0.0396,0.0399,0.0397,0.0386,0.039,0.0375,0.0367,0.0368,0.035,0.0354,
0.0336,0.0323,0.0313,0.0295,0.0282,0.0265,0.024,0.0226,0.0219,0.0183)
k <- c(12.11,10.69,11.18,9.64,9.35,8.21,6.89,5.74,4.56,3.6,
3.27,2.04,1.11,-0.44,-1.05,-1.03,-1.84,-2.9,-4.03,-4.12,
-5.18,-5.64,-6,-6.51,-6.91,-6.9,-8.32,-8.53,-9.69,-9.31)
set.seed(123)
M <- exp(outer(k,b)+matrix(a,nrow=30,ncol=30,byrow=TRUE)+rnorm(900,0,0.035))
fit <- LCS(x=x,M=M,curve="makeham",h=30,jumpoff=2)
coef(fit)
forecast::forecast(fit)
plot(fit)
residuals(fit)

demofit documentation built on April 9, 2026, 5:09 p.m.