Nonparametric inference procedures for multistate life table analysis

Recent generalizations of the classical single state life table procedures to the multistate case provide the means to analyze simultaneously the mobility and mortality experience of one or more cohorts. Within this multidimensional demographic literature, however, little attention has been paid thus far to problems of statistical inference. In this paper, an inferential and hypothesis testing strategy is proposed based on fairly general nonpara‐metric matrix permutation procedures. Several examples are presented to illustrate this matrix combinatorial approach to hypothesis testing.