Essays on Applied Semiparametric Econometrics

Essays on Applied Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Tomás Andrés Rau Binder
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780549168775
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
This dissertation consists of two essays. In the first essay I propose a new class of flexible microeconometric models that incorporates endogenous regressors and sorting. Existing models, including Garen's (1984) correlated random coefficients model, and Newey, Powell, and Vella's (1999) fully-flexible model with an additive error, can be derived from a structural equation with unobserved heterogeneity by imposing homogeneity and constancy assumptions on the first and second derivatives. I consider a less restrictive model that imposes homogeneity assumptions on the second partial derivative of the structural equation. Assuming the existence of suitable instrumental variables, the model can be estimated using a generalized control function approach. I consider an application to the estimation of the returns to education in Chile, exploiting variation across regions and cohorts in educational infrastructure and compulsory schooling laws. Using penalized spline functions to approximate the components of the average structural response function, I find that the local average returns to schooling are typically under-estimated by flexible models that ignore the endogeneity of schooling. I also find limited evidence of comparative advantage bias in the returns to certain levels of education.

Essays on Applied Semiparametric Econometrics

Essays on Applied Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Tomás Andrés Rau Binder
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780549168775
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
This dissertation consists of two essays. In the first essay I propose a new class of flexible microeconometric models that incorporates endogenous regressors and sorting. Existing models, including Garen's (1984) correlated random coefficients model, and Newey, Powell, and Vella's (1999) fully-flexible model with an additive error, can be derived from a structural equation with unobserved heterogeneity by imposing homogeneity and constancy assumptions on the first and second derivatives. I consider a less restrictive model that imposes homogeneity assumptions on the second partial derivative of the structural equation. Assuming the existence of suitable instrumental variables, the model can be estimated using a generalized control function approach. I consider an application to the estimation of the returns to education in Chile, exploiting variation across regions and cohorts in educational infrastructure and compulsory schooling laws. Using penalized spline functions to approximate the components of the average structural response function, I find that the local average returns to schooling are typically under-estimated by flexible models that ignore the endogeneity of schooling. I also find limited evidence of comparative advantage bias in the returns to certain levels of education.

Essays on Identification and Semiparametric Econometrics

Essays on Identification and Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Paul Schrimpf
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 146

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Book Description
This dissertation is a collection of three independent essays in theoretical and applied econometrics. The first chapter analyzes dynamic games with continuous states and controls. There are two main contributions. First, we give conditions under which the payoff function is nonparametrically identified by the observed distribution of states and controls. The identification conditions are fairly general and can be expected to hold in many potential applications. The key identifying restrictions include that one of the partial derivatives of the payoff function is known and that there is some component of the state space that enters the policy function, but not the payoff function directly. The second contribution of the first chapter is to propose a two-step semiparametric estimator for the model. In the first step the transition densities and policy function are estimated nonparametrically. In the second step, the parameters of the payoff function are estimated from the optimality conditions of the model. We give high-level conditions on the first step nonparametric estimates for the parameter estimates to be consistent and parameters to be v/fn-asymptotically normal. Finally, we show that a kernel based estimator satisfies these conditions. The second chapter, which is coauthored with Liran Einav and Amy Finkelstein, analyzes the welfare cost of adverse selection in the U.K. annuity market. We develop a model of annuity contract choice and estimate it using data from the U.K. annuity market. The model allows for private information about mortality risk as well as heterogeneity in preferences over different contract options. We focus on the choice of length of guarantee among individuals who are required to buy annuities. The results suggest that asymmetric information along the guarantee margin reduces welfare relative to a first best symmetric information benchmark by about 2 percent of annuitized wealth. We also find that by requiring that individuals choose the longest guarantee period allowed, mandates could achieve the first-best allocation. The third chapter develops a test for the exogeneity assumptions of classical factor models based on the fixed interactive effects estimator of Bai (2005). The exact form of the test is given for simple linear models. Simulations are used to asses the test's performance. The application of the test to more complicated models is also considered. The test is applied to a model of education as an example.

Three Essays on Semiparametric Econometrics

Three Essays on Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Hongjun Li
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This dissertation aims at investigating the theory and application of semiparametric econometrics. I first inspect the selection of optimal bandwidth using the cross-validation method for the kernel estimation of cumulative distribution/survivor functions. Then, I analyze the determination of the number of factors with the methods of principal component and information criteria. I also show the application of semiparametric methods to "purchasing power parity" puzzle. Firstly, I propose a data-driven least squares cross-validation method to optimally select smoothing parameters for the nonparametric estimation of cumulative distribution/ survivor functions. The general multivariate covariates can be continuous, discrete/ordered categorical or a mix of either. I establish the asymptotic optimality of least squares cross-validation method. Also, I show that the estimators of cumulative distribution/survivor functions using the smoothing parameters selected by the proposed method is asymptotically normally distributed. Monte Carlo simulation verifies the finite-sample properties of the least squares cross-validation method. Secondly, I provide some discussions on the econometric theory for factor models of large dimensions where the number of factors (r) is allowed to increase as the two dimensions, cross-sections (N) and time dimensions (T) increase. I mainly focus on the determination of the number of factors. I extend the existing panel criteria to high dimension case where r may be increasing with N or T. I show that the number of factors can be consistently estimated using the criteria. Also, Monte-Carlo simulation demonstrates the finite sample properties of the proposed estimating method. Lastly, I consider an empirical application of semiparametric econometrics to the problem of purchasing power parity (hereafter PPP) hypothesis test. Traditional linear cointegration tests of PPP hypothesis often lead to rejection of the PPP hypothesis. More recent studies allowing for some sort of nonlinearity in econometric modelings suggest mixed results and leave this problem as an unresolved issue. Therefore, I analyze PPP hypothesis within a semiparametric framework using the varying coefficient model with integrated variables, which can capture the nonlinearity of the economic structures. Applying the semiparametric functional cointegration test method, I conduct the cointegration test of PPP hypothesis between U.S. and Canada, U.S. and Japan, and U.S. and U.K., respectively to test the PPP hypothesis. In contrast to the usual findings based on linear model PPP hypothesis testing, the semiparametric model based tests provide supporting evidence of the PPP hypothesis. The electronic version of this dissertation is accessible from http://hdl.handle.net/1969.1/152605

Essays in Semiparametric Econometrics

Essays in Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Olga Voyteshenko Livingston
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Econometrics
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
Two essays are focused on semiparametric econometric methods. The first essay investigates applicability of the smooth back tting estimator (SBE) to statistical analysis of residential energy consumption. The second essay attempts to incorporate additivity restrictions into semiparametric stochastic frontier estimation. The procedure described in the first study is used to estimate the directional regressions for each of the additive components. These estimates are used as a pilot for stochastic frontier estimation. The essay contains an empirical study of power generating units in the US.

Essays on Nonparametric Econometrics with Applications to Consumer and Financial Economics

Essays on Nonparametric Econometrics with Applications to Consumer and Financial Economics PDF Author: Yi Zheng
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Credit
Languages : en
Pages : 98

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Book Description
Abstract: This dissertation is composed of three chapters centering on nonparametric econometrics with applications to consumer demand system analysis, value-at-risk analysis of commodity future prices, and credit risk analysis of home mortgage portfolios. The first chapter, based on my joint research with Abdoul Sam considers a semiparametric estimation model for a censored consumer demand system with micro data. A common attribute of disaggregated household data is the censoring of commodities. Maximum likelihood and existing two-step estimators of censored demand systems yield biased and inconsistent estimates when the assumed joint distribution of the disturbances is incorrect. This essay proposes a semiparametric estimator that retains the computational advantage of the two-step methods while circumventing their potential distributional misspecification. The key difference between the proposed estimator and existing two-step counterparts is that the parameters of the binary censoring equations are estimated using a distribution-free single-index model. We implement the proposed estimator using household-level data obtained from the Hainan province in China. Horrowitz and Härdle (1994)'s specification test lends support to our approach. The second chapter is an empirical application of a nonparametric estimator of Value-at-Risk on the cattle feeding margin. Value-at-Risk, known as VaR is a common measure of downside market risk associated with an asset or a portfolio of assets. It has been used as a standard tool of predicting potential portfolio losses for twenty years in the financial industry. Recently VaR has gained popularity in agricultural economics literature since the market price risks associated with agricultural commodities are under evaluation. As initial empirical findings suggest that the performance of any VaR estimation technique is sensitive to the types of data set (portfolio composition) used in developing and evaluating the estimates, agricultural data provides a unique laboratory to further explore VaR and its estimation approaches. This essay as a first attempt applies a distribution-free nonparametric kernel estimator of VaR in an agricultural context, the cattle feeding margin using futures data. The empirical results suggest that the nonparametric VaR estimates enjoy a significant efficiency gain without losing much accuracy compared to the parametric estimates. The third chapter measures credit risks associated with residential mortgage loans. Credit risk is the primary source of risk for real estate lenders. Recent advancements in the measurement and management of credit risk give lenders with sophisticated internal risk models a significant comparative advantage over other lenders in terms of capital optimization and risk controlling. This manuscript helps understand the determinants of credit risk and acquire perspectives on how it is distributed in the current or future loan portfolios. This essay contributes to the existing volume of literature as it incorporates the nonparametric estimation technique into default risk analysis. The CreditRisk model is modified and estimated using the consumer side of information. The model identifies the factors determining household default risks and generates a full loan loss distribution at the portfolio level using consumer finance survey data. In the end, portfolio management strategies are discussed.

Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods in Econometrics

Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods in Econometrics PDF Author: Joel L. Horowitz
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 0387928707
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Book Description
Standard methods for estimating empirical models in economics and many other fields rely on strong assumptions about functional forms and the distributions of unobserved random variables. Often, it is assumed that functions of interest are linear or that unobserved random variables are normally distributed. Such assumptions simplify estimation and statistical inference but are rarely justified by economic theory or other a priori considerations. Inference based on convenient but incorrect assumptions about functional forms and distributions can be highly misleading. Nonparametric and semiparametric statistical methods provide a way to reduce the strength of the assumptions required for estimation and inference, thereby reducing the opportunities for obtaining misleading results. These methods are applicable to a wide variety of estimation problems in empirical economics and other fields, and they are being used in applied research with increasing frequency. The literature on nonparametric and semiparametric estimation is large and highly technical. This book presents the main ideas underlying a variety of nonparametric and semiparametric methods. It is accessible to graduate students and applied researchers who are familiar with econometric and statistical theory at the level taught in graduate-level courses in leading universities. The book emphasizes ideas instead of technical details and provides as intuitive an exposition as possible. Empirical examples illustrate the methods that are presented. This book updates and greatly expands the author’s previous book on semiparametric methods in econometrics. Nearly half of the material is new.

Nonparametric and Semiparametric Methods in Econometrics and Statistics

Nonparametric and Semiparametric Methods in Econometrics and Statistics PDF Author: William A. Barnett
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521424318
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 512

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Book Description
Papers from a 1988 symposium on the estimation and testing of models that impose relatively weak restrictions on the stochastic behaviour of data.

Three Essays in Applied Nonparametric and Semiparametric Regression Estimation

Three Essays in Applied Nonparametric and Semiparametric Regression Estimation PDF Author: Michael S. Delgado
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781267546210
Category : Econometric models
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description


Essays in Non- and Semiparametric Econometrics

Essays in Non- and Semiparametric Econometrics PDF Author: Christoph Rothe
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 102

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Essays on Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods in Econometrics

Essays on Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods in Econometrics PDF Author: Sokbae Lee
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Econometrics
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description