Microeconometrics

摘要

I survey recent developments in microeconometric methodology that have significant implications for applied research. I have limited my time period to 1994 and later. Semiparametric and nonparametric models of consumer demand allow for flexible models of consumer response to price changes and for tests of the implications of consumer demand theory such as the integrability conditions, Hausman and Newey (1995). These models use data on individual consumption so that economic theory can be applied directly to the data. Asymptotic distribution theory is developed so that consumer welfare statistics for consumers surplus and deadweight loss are root-n consistent when averaged across the sample. Discrete choice models for purchases of differentiated products have been applied to aggregate data where individual models of demand are aggregated explicitly, Berry et al. (1995). Panel data models have been applied to supermarket scanner data, which has recently become available, for models of consumer purchases where identification and estimation utilize covariance restrictions of the Hausman-Taylor (1981) type. These models permit estimation of consumer welfare changes from increased variety of differentiated products and from new goods, Hausman (1997).This research should lead to more informed discussion of economic theory models of differentiated products industries with imperfect competition.