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优化的断点回归设计AI 解读

The increasing popularity of regression discontinuity methods for causal inference in observational studies has led to a proliferation of different estimating strategies, most of which involve first fitting nonparametric regression models on both sides of a treatment assignment boundary and then reporting plug-in estimates for the effect of interest. In applications, however, it is often difficult to tune the nonparametric regressions in a way that is well calibrated for the…

目标总体仅有边际分布时的联合间接标准化AI 解读

It is a common interest in medicine to determine whether a hospital meets a benchmark created from an aggregate reference population, after accounting for differences in distributions of multiple covariates. Due to the difficulties of collecting individual-level data, however, it is often the case that only marginal distributions of the covariates are available, making covariate-adjusted comparison challenging. We propose and evaluate a novel approach for conducting indirect…

析因实验中的因果交互作用：联合分析应用AI 解读

We study causal interaction in factorial experiments, in which several factors, each with multiple levels, are randomized to form a large number of possible treatment combinations. Examples of such experiments include conjoint analysis, which is often used by social scientists to analyze multidimensional preferences in a population. To characterize the structure of causal interaction in factorial experiments, we propose a new causal interaction effect, called the average…

观察性研究中代表性干预下风险的逆概率加权估计AI 解读

Researchers are often interested in using observational data to estimate the effect on a health outcome of maintaining a continuous treatment within a pre-specified range over time; e.g. "always exercise at least 30 minutes per day". There may be many precise interventions that could achieve this range. In this paper we consider representative interventions. These are special cases of random dynamic interventions; interventions under which treatment at each time is assigned…

基于增量倾向得分干预的非参数因果效应AI 解读

Most work in causal inference considers deterministic interventions that set each unit’s treatment to some fixed value. However, under positivity violations these interventions can lead to nonidentification, inefficiency, and effects with little practical relevance. Further, corresponding effects in longitudinal studies are highly sensitive to the curse of dimensionality, resulting in widespread use of unrealistic parametric models. We propose a novel solution to these…

病例—对照点模式数据的随机拟似然AI 解读

We propose a novel stochastic quasi-likelihood estimation procedure for case-control point processes. Quasi-likelihood for point processes depends on a certain optimal weight function and for the new method the weight function is stochastic since it depends on the control point pattern. The new procedure also provides a computationally efficient implementation of quasi-likelihood for univariate point processes in which case a synthetic control point process is simulated by…

成对匹配观察性研究的敏感性值AI 解读

This article proposes a new quantity called the “sensitivity value,” which is defined as the minimum strength of unmeasured confounders needed to change the qualitative conclusions of a naive analysis assuming no unmeasured confounder. We establish the asymptotic normality of the sensitivity value in pair-matched observational studies. The theoretical results are then used to approximate the power of a sensitivity analysis and select the design of a study. We explore the…

关于“不可观测选择与系数稳定性：理论与证据”及“测量不准的混杂因素放在左侧比右侧更有用”的评论AI 解读

We establish a link between the approaches proposed by Oster (2019) and Pei, Pischke, and Schwandt (2019) which contribute to the development of inferential procedures for causal effects in the challenging and empirically relevant situation where the unknown data-generation process is not included in the set of models considered by the investigator. We use the general misspecification framework recently proposed by De Luca, Magnus, and Peracchi (2018) to analyze and…

测量不准的混杂因素放在回归左侧更有用AI 解读

Researchers frequently test identifying assumptions in regression-based research designs (which include instrumental variables or difference-in-differences models) by adding additional control variables on the right-hand side of the regression. If such additions do not affect the coefficient of interest (much), a study is presumed to be reliable. We caution that such invariance may result from the fact that the observed variables used in such robustness checks are often poor…

凸锥假设检验的几何：广义似然比检验与极小极大半径AI 解读

We consider a compound testing problem within the Gaussian sequence model in which the null and alternative are specified by a pair of closed, convex cones. Such cone testing problem arises in various applications, including detection of treatment effects, trend detection in econometrics, signal detection in radar processing and shape-constrained inference in nonparametric statistics. We provide a sharp characterization of the GLRT testing radius up to a universal…

通过定制损失函数实现协变量平衡的倾向得分估计AI 解读

In observational studies, propensity scores are commonly estimated by maximum likelihood but may fail to balance high-dimensional pretreatment covariates even after specification search. We introduce a general framework that unifies and generalizes several recent proposals to improve covariate balance when designing an observational study. Instead of the likelihood function, we propose to optimize special loss functions—covariate balancing scoring rules (CBSR)—to estimate…

广义随机森林AI 解读

We propose generalized random forests, a method for nonparametric statistical estimation based on random forests (Breiman [Mach. Learn. 45 (2001) 5–32]) that can be used to fit any quantity of interest identified as the solution to a set of local moment equations. Following the literature on local maximum likelihood estimation, our method considers a weighted set of nearby training examples; however, instead of using classical kernel weighting functions that are prone to a…

误分类二元内生解释变量效应的识别AI 解读

This paper studies identification of the effect of a mis-classified, binary, endogenous regressor when a discrete-valued instrumental variable is available. We begin by showing that the only existing point identification result for this model is incorrect. We go on to derive the sharp identified set under mean independence assumptions for the instrument and measurement error. The resulting bounds are novel and informative, but fail to point identify the effect of interest.…

大衰退期间融资约束的就业效应AI 解读

Abstract Employment declined substantially during the 2007–2009 recession, especially in small and young firms. Using confidential firm-level data of the universe of firms and a difference-in-differences methodology, this paper estimates that financial constraints reduced employment growth by 4 to 8 percentage points in small firms relative to large firms and by 7 to 9 percentage points in young relative to old firms. I find that the effect of financial constraints on small…

招聘税收抵免的有效性AI 解读

This article analyses the effectiveness of hiring credits. Using comprehensive administrative data, we show that the French hiring credit, implemented during the Great Recession, had significant positive employment effects and no effects on wages. Relying on the quasi-experimental variation in labour cost triggered by the hiring credit, we estimate a structural search and matching model. Simulations of counterfactual policies show that the effectiveness of the hiring credit…

双变量Probit模型、极大似然、伪真参数与部分识别AI 解读

This paper examines the notion of “identification by functional form” for two equation triangular systems for binary endogenous variables by providing a bridge between the literature on the recursive bivariate probit model and that on partial identification. We evaluate the impact of functional form on the performance of (quasi) maximum likelihood estimators, and investigate the practical importance of available instruments in both cases of correct and incorrect…

利用局部工具变量曲线进行连续工具变量的稳健因果推断AI 解读

Summary Instrumental variables are commonly used to estimate effects of a treatment afflicted by unmeasured confounding, and in practice instruments are often continuous (e.g. measures of distance, or treatment preference). However, available methods for continuous instruments have important limitations: they either require restrictive parametric assumptions for identification, or else rely on modelling both the outcome and the treatment process well (and require modelling…

未知函数分布相等的综合非参数检验AI 解读

Summary We present a novel family of non-parametric omnibus tests of the hypothesis that two unknown but estimable functions are equal in distribution when applied to the observed data structure. We developed these tests, which represent a generalization of the maximum mean discrepancy tests described by Gretton and colleagues, using recent developments from the higher order pathwise differentiability literature. Despite their complex derivation, the associated test…

工具变量不足时多内生变量三角模型的识别与估计AI 解读

We develop a novel identification method for a partially linear model with multiple endogenous variables of interest but a single instrumental variable, which could even be binary. We present an easy-to-implement consistent estimator for the parametric part. This estimator retains n-convergence rate and asymptotic normality even though we have a generated regressor in our setup. The nonparametric part of the model is also identified. We also outline how our identification…

内生误报下的处理效应估计AI 解读

Participation in social programs is often misreported in survey data, complicating the estimation of treatment effects. We propose a model to estimate treatment effects under endogenous participation and endogenous misreporting. We present an expression for the asymptotic bias of both OLS and IV estimators and discuss the conditions under which sign reversal may occur. We provide a method for eliminating this bias when researchers have access to information regarding…

断点回归设计中的处理效应异质性检验AI 解读

Treatment effect heterogeneity is frequently studied in regression discontinuity (RD) applications. This paper proposes, under the RD setup, formal tests for treatment effect heterogeneity among individuals with different observed pre-treatment characteristics. The proposed tests study whether a policy treatment (1) is beneficial for at least some subpopulations defined by pre-treatment covariate values, (2) has any impact on at least some subpopulations, and (3) has a…

民主确实促进增长AI 解读

We provide evidence that democracy has a positive effect on GDP per capita. Our dynamic panel strategy controls for country fixed effects and the rich dynamics of GDP, which otherwise confound the effect of democracy. To reduce measurement error, we introduce a new indicator of democracy that consolidates previous measures. Our baseline results show that democratizations increase GDP per capita by about 20 percent in the long run. We find similar effects using a propensity…

文化与税收AI 解读

We propose a difference-in-differences strategy to identify the existence of interjurisdictional tax competition. Our strategy rests on differences between desired tax levels determined by culture-specific preferences and equilibrium tax levels determined by fiscal externalities and by preferences. While preferences differ systematically between French-speaking and German-speaking Swiss municipalities, local income tax burdens exhibit smooth spatial gradients. To qualify the…

对 PENCOMP 的讨论AI 解读

We would like to congratulate Zhou, Elliott, and Little (henceforth referred to as ZEL) on an interesting article in an important area of research. ZEL propose a new approach for causal inference u...