We are pleased to welcome some of the world's foremost experts in the field of microsimulation to New Zealand

 

Michael Wolfson and Steve Gribble came together in 1984 at Statistics Canada. Together they founded and developed a world-class microsimulation research program that continues today, almost 30 years on. The workshop provides the opportunity to learn from their first-hand experience in developing microsimulation within government.
 

Models developed at Statistics Canada include POHEM - a population health model that tracks risk behaviours and diseases and allows 'what-if?' health policy analysis; LifePaths which models individuals and families across the life course, and is used to analyse, develop, and cost government programs that have an essential longitudinal component; and Demosim, a microsimulation model designed for population projections. 
 

John Creedy is a leader in the development of behavioural microsimulation modelling in New Zealand and Australia.

 

Martin Spielauer is an expert in demographic and socio-economic microsimulation with 15 years of international experience.

 

 

 

Dr Michael C. Wolfson

 

Dr Michael C. Wolfson, B.Sc., (Toronto - mathematics, computer science and economics 1971), Ph.D. (Cambridge – Economics 1977) retired as Assistant Chief Statistician, Analysis and Development, at Statistics Canada in 2009.  He was awarded a Canada Research Chair in Population Health Modeling / Populomics in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa in 2010.

 

Dr. Wolfson’s areas of expertise include program review and evaluation, tax/transfer policy, pension policy, income distribution, design of health information systems, microsimulation modeling of socio-economic policy and health dynamics, and analysis of the determinants of health.

 

He held positions in the Treasury Board Secretariat, the Department of Finance, the Privy Council Office, the House of Commons, and the Deputy Prime Minister’s Office prior to joining Statistics Canada.  He was also a Fellow of the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Program in Population Health (1988-2003).

 

His numerous articles have addressed topics such as assessing the inter-generational equity of Canada’s pension and health care systems, the design of an appropriate system of health statistics, modeling disease determinants and treatments, income  inequality and polarization trends, and income and income inequality as determinants of population health. 

 

Dr. Wolfson is a Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences and an elected member of the International Statistical Institute. 

 

 

Steve Gribble

 

Steve Gribble retired from Statistics Canada three years ago, where he was Director of Modeling Division.  At Statistics Canada, Steve played key roles in many modeling projects, including a large scale publicly-available static tax/transfer microsimulation model (SPSD/M), a large scale dynamic microsimulation model for policy development and analysis (LifePaths), a model of child vaccination policy for Peru and Bangladesh (CVMM), a model of HIV for South Africa (HIVMM), and an emerging disease model of SARS (SARSMM).  

 

Steve also designed the publicly-available Modgen language and development platform for event-based longitudinal microsimulation.  Modgen is the technology behind the Statistics Canada models DemoSim, LifePaths, POHEM, and CRMM, as well as various models developed outside of Statistics Canada.  Steve also played a lead architecture role in Modgen Web, a platform to publish, edit, run, and interactively visualize results of arbitrary Modgen models using a web browser over the internet.

 

Since retiring from Statistics Canada Steve has worked on chronic disease microsimulation models with the OECD, and is the lead for HPVMM, an infectious disease agent-based model of HPV, the virus which causes cervical cancer.  HPVMM is an event-based model which includes partnership formation and dissolution over the life course, disease transmission through a large and dynamically changing sexual network, and a detailed representation of vaccination policy.  Steve is also one of two lead developers in the openM++ project, an open source cross-platform replacement for Modgen, which is planned to evolve beyond Modgen.”

 

 

Professor John Creedy

 

Professor Creedy is visiting New Zealand for three years, on leave from the University of Melbourne where he is The Truby Williams Professor of Economics. He is splitting his time between the Tax Strategy section of the New Zealand Treasury, and Victoria University of Wellington's School of Accounting and Commercial Law. His main research interests are public economics, labour economics, income distribution and the history of economic analysis.

 

He has a B.Sc. Economics with Statistics (1970 Bristol University, UK) and a B.Phil. Economics (1972 Balliol College, Oxford University).

 

Professor Creedy was Editor and Co-editor of the Australian Economic Review from 1989-2000, and Associate Editor of: Review of Income and Wealth; Bulletin of Economic Research; Fiscal Studies; Journal of Economic Inequality; FinanzArchiv; Australian Journal of Labour Economics; International Journal of Microsimulation.

 

He is author and co-author of 36 books, 17 edited books, 54 bookchapters and over 250 refereed journal articles.

 

Martin Spielauer

 

Martin Spielauer is an expert in demographic and socio-economic microsimulation with 15 years of experience in microsimulation modelling. He has developed or contributed to models in a wide range of subject matter fields including demography, education, saving & wealth, pension systems, Aboriginal studies, poverty and health.

 

Martin has been engaged in microsimulation projects around the world, including Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, France, India, Japan, New Zealand, Poland, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, and the US. He also has provided training and has been teaching microsimulation modelling and programming on countless occasions, including at the European Doctoral School for Demography in Germany, France, Sweden and Spain. Martin has published extensively both in peer-reviewed journals as well as publications of governments and international agencies. 

 

In New Zealand, Martin has been engaged in microsimulation projects since 2010, roles including advisory positions, the provision of training, and - most recently - co-authoring a scoping report on the use of microsimulation in the field of early childhood education. The present workshop was inspired by recommendations developed in this study.