Assessing Inference Methods

Abstract:

We analyze different types of simulations that applied researchers may use to assess their inference methods. We show that different types of simulations vary in many dimensions when considered as inference assessments. Moreover, we show that natural ways of running simulations may lead to misleading conclusions, and we propose alternatives. We then provide evidence that even some simple assessments can detect problems in many different settings. Alternative assessments that potentially better approximate the true data generating process may detect problems that simpler assessments would not detect. However, they are not uniformly dominant in this dimension, and may imply some costs.

About Bruno Ferman

Bruno Ferman is Professor of Economics at the Sao Paulo School of Economics-FGV. Bruno received his PhD in Economics at MIT in 2012. He works on Econometrics (with a focus on topics related to policy evaluation, synthetic control method and difference-in-differences) and Applied Microeconomics. Bruno serves as Associate Editor for the Journal of Political Economy: Microeconomics. His work has appeared at, for example, Econometrica, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Journal of the American Statistical Association, Review of Economics and Statistics, Quantitative Economics, and Journal of Econometrics.

More details on his research are available at https://sites.google.com/site/brunoferman/

Events Econometrics: https://www.eur.nl/en/ese/events/assessing-inferen...

Website econometrics:https://www.eur.nl/en/ese/department-econometrics

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