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Journal of Population Sciences

Table 4 Mean absolute forecast error (MAFE) of remaining life expectancy at age 65 for the first and fifth year in the forecasting period and standard deviation (SD) of the increase/decrease of the life expectancy at age 65 in 2020 between ten successive forecasts, for six different choices of the jump-off rates applied to a Lee-Carter model with three principal components, for eight Western European countries, men and women combined, fitting periods 1960–2005, 1960–2006, …, 1960–2014

From: Comparing strategies for matching mortality forecasts to the most recently observed data: exploring the trade-off between accuracy and robustness

Jump-off rates

FRA

ESP

SWE

BEL

UK

NOR

FIN

NLD

Av1

Standard deviation in 2020

 Model values

0.17

0.23

0.25

0.14

0.16

0.28

0.50

0.20

0.24

 Last observed values

0.21

0.30

0.17

0.20

0.14

0.19

0.45

0.25

0.24

 Average 2 years observed

0.20

0.25

0.18

0.15

0.13

0.17

0.51

0.20

0.22

 Average 3 years observed

0.18

0.24

0.19

0.14

0.16

0.22

0.54

0.21

0.23

 Average 4 years observed

0.18

0.23

0.20

0.13

0.17

0.23

0.53

0.21

0.23

 Average 5 years observed

0.18

0.24

0.21

0.13

0.17

0.24

0.52

0.21

0.24

Mean absolute forecast error in the first year of the forecasting period

 Model values

0.24

0.24

0.22

0.12

0.21

0.22

0.36

0.21

0.23

 Last observed values

0.14

0.18

0.13

0.14

0.14

0.13

0.30

0.18

0.17

 Average 2 years observed

0.15

0.15

0.12

0.12

0.15

0.13

0.31

0.16

0.16

 Average 3 years observed

0.15

0.15

0.12

0.12

0.17

0.14

0.31

0.17

0.17

 Average 4 years observed

0.16

0.16

0.12

0.12

0.18

0.15

0.31

0.18

0.17

 Average 5 years observed

0.17

0.16

0.13

0.12

0.19

0.15

0.32

0.19

0.18

Mean absolute forecast error in the fifth year of the forecasting period

 Model values

0.31

0.40

0.31

0.18

0.51

0.43

0.38

0.41

0.37

 Last observed values

0.18

0.23

0.15

0.17

0.43

0.28

0.24

0.36

0.26

 Average 2 years observed

0.20

0.24

0.20

0.20

0.46

0.28

0.25

0.36

0.27

 Average 3 years observed

0.21

0.25

0.19

0.21

0.48

0.29

0.25

0.37

0.28

 Average 4 years observed

0.23

0.27

0.20

0.22

0.50

0.30

0.25

0.37

0.29

 Average 5 years observed

0.24

0.28

0.22

0.21

0.51

0.32

0.28

0.39

0.31

  1. The lowest MAFE is marked in bold, the highest MAFE in italics
  2. 1Unweigthed average of all eight countries