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Merge Employment Periods with Multiple Consolidation Modes

Source: R/merge_consecutive_employment.R
merge_consecutive_employment.Rd

Merges employment periods using different consolidation strategies based on the over_id column from vecshift() output. The over_id column identifies continuous overlapping employment periods, enabling sophisticated consolidation approaches for employment history analysis.

Usage

merge_consecutive_employment(dt, consolidation_type = "both")

Arguments

dt

A data.table output from vecshift() containing temporal segments with columns:

  • cf: Person identifier

  • inizio: Segment start date

  • fine: Segment end date

  • arco: Number of overlapping contracts (0 = unemployment)

  • prior: Employment type (numeric)

  • over_id: Overlap identifier (0 = unemployment, >0 = overlapping periods)

  • Additional columns: Any other contract parameters (numeric or character)

consolidation_type

Character string specifying consolidation approach:

  • "both" (DEFAULT): First consolidate overlapping periods (same over_id > 0), then merge consecutive periods. Provides complete employment history consolidation.

  • "overlapping": Only consolidate segments with same over_id > 0. Merges simultaneous/overlapping contracts into single periods.

  • "consecutive": Only merge periods that are contiguous in time, regardless of over_id. Traditional consecutive period merging.

  • "none": No consolidation. Returns original segments unchanged.

Value

A data.table with consolidated employment periods containing:

  • cf: Person identifier

  • inizio: Period start date

  • fine: Period end date

  • arco: Number of overlapping contracts (preserved for unemployment)

  • prior: Duration-weighted mean priority for collapsed periods

  • Character columns: Concatenated as "first->last" for collapsed periods

  • Numeric columns: Duration-weighted mean value for collapsed periods

  • Numeric columns with "_direction" suffix: Direction of change (last - first)

  • durata: Duration of the period in days

  • collapsed: Logical indicating if period was collapsed (TRUE) or not (FALSE)

Examples

if (FALSE) { # \dontrun{
library(data.table)
# Create sample output from vecshift with over_id
dt <- data.table(
  cf = c("A", "A", "A", "A", "B", "B"),
  inizio = as.Date(c("2023-01-01", "2023-02-01", "2023-02-15", "2023-04-01",
                     "2023-01-01", "2023-03-01")),
  fine = as.Date(c("2023-01-31", "2023-02-14", "2023-03-31", "2023-04-30",
                   "2023-02-28", "2023-03-31")),
  arco = c(1, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0),
  prior = c(1, 0, 0.5, 1, 1, 0),
  over_id = c(1, 0, 2, 3, 1, 0),
  contract_type = c("FT", NA, "PT", "FT", "FT", NA),
  salary = c(3000, NA, 1500, 3200, 2800, NA)
)

# Complete consolidation (overlapping then consecutive)
result_both <- merge_consecutive_employment(dt, consolidation_type = "both")

# Only merge overlapping contracts (same over_id > 0)
result_overlapping <- merge_consecutive_employment(dt, consolidation_type = "overlapping")

# Only merge consecutive periods (traditional approach)
result_consecutive <- merge_consecutive_employment(dt, consolidation_type = "consecutive")

# No consolidation (return original)
result_none <- merge_consecutive_employment(dt, consolidation_type = "none")
} # }