A new class of regression type models termed essentially linear models is proposed. The class is characterized by geometric considerations. Within the class the distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator is easily approximated by a natural extension of the pstar-formula even though the MLE...

The difficulty of conducting relevant experiments has long been regarded as the central challenge to learning about the economy from data. The standard solution, going back to Haavelmo's famous "The Probability Approach in Econometrics" (1944), involved two elements: first, it placed substantial...

Economics places a high premium on completeness of explanation. Typical general-equilibrium accounts of economic phenomena are preferred to partial equilibrium accounts on the ground that important interactions are necessarily omitted in the latter. A similar preference for microfoundational...

Econometricians tend to hold simultaneously two views in tension with each other: an apparent anti-realism that holds that all models are false and at best useful constructs or approximations to true models and an apparent realism that models are to be judged by their success at capturing an...

This paper evaluates the role of various volatility specifications, such as multiple stochastic volatility (SV) factors and jump components, in appropriate modeling of equity return distributions. We use estimation technology that facilitates non-nested model comparisons and use a long data set...

This paper provides a general framework that enables many existing inference methods for predictive accuracy to be used in applications that involve forecasts of latent target variables. Such applications include the forecasting of volatility, correlation, beta, quadratic variation, jump...

We evaluate various economic modelsí relative performance in forecasting future US output growth and inflation on a monthly basis. Our approach takes into account the possibility that the modelsí relative performance can be varying over time. We show that the modelsí relative performance has,...

We provide an extensive evaluation of the predictive performance of the U.S. yield curve for U.S. GDP growth by using a new test for forecast breakdown as well as a variety of in-sample and out-of-sample testing procedures. Empirical research over the past decades uncovered a strong predictive...

We propose a new Information Criterion for Impulse Response Function Matching estimators of the structural parameters of macroeconomic models. The main advantage of our procedure is that it allows the researcher to select the impulse responses that are most informative about the deep parameters,...

This paper studies the dynamic relationship between exchange rate fluctuations and world commodity price movements. Taking into account parameter instability, we demonstrate surprisingly robust evidence that exchange rates predict world commodity price movements, both in-sample and...