Huazhen Lin, Paul S. F. Yip and Feng Chen (2009). Estimating the population size for a multiple list problem with an open population. Vol. 19, No. 1, 177-196.

Statistica Sinica 19 (2009), 177-196

ESTIMATING THE POPULATION SIZE FOR A MULTIPLE

LIST PROBLEM WITH AN OPEN POPULATION

Huazhen Lin, Paul S. F. Yip and Feng Chen

Sichuan University, University of Hong Kong and

University of New South Wales

Abstract: A semiparametric method using a local polynomial is proposed to estimate the population size at a specific time from multiple lists of an open population. The asymptotic distribution for the proposed estimators is derived. Simulation studies show that the proposed procedure works much better than existing methods. In addition, we provide a simple and efficient method to deal with the variable selection problem in a log-linear model when the number of the lists is large. The method is applied to estimate the number of drug-abusers in Hong Kong over the period 1977-1997.

Key words and phrases: Drug abusers, local polynomial, multiple-list, open population.