Book Chapter

MIC-CORE: a tool for microsimulation

Zinn, S., Himmelspach, J., Gampe, J., Uhrmacher, A. M.
In: Rossetti, M. D., Hill, R. R., Johansson, B., Dunkin, A., Ingalls, R.G. (Eds.): Proceedings of the 2009 Winter Simulation Conference: December 13 - 16, 2009, Austin, Texas, U.S.A.; inclusion of MASM (Modeling and Analysis of Semiconductor Manufacturing)[CD-ROM]
Piscataway, NJ, IEEE (2009)

Abstract

Microsimulation is an increasingly popular tool in the social sciences. Individual behavior is described by a (commonly stochastic) model and subsequently simulated to study outcomes on the aggregate level. Demographic projections are a prominent area of application. Despite numerous available tools often new software is designed and implemented for specific applications. In this paper we describe how a modeling and simulation framework, JAMES, was used to create a specialized tool for population projections, the Mic-Core. Reusing validated and well-tested modeling and simulation functionality significantly reduced development time while keeping performance levels high. We document how the Mic-Core was built as plug-ins to JAMES and illustrate the performance of the resulting tool. We demonstrate how the concept of a modeling and simulation framework enabled successful software reuse of available functionality and briefly report of future work.
Keywords: microsimulation, projections, software
The Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR) in Rostock is one of the leading demographic research centers in the world. It's part of the Max Planck Society, the internationally renowned German research society.