Using a comprehensive international trade data set we investigate empirical regularities (known as Zipf’s Law or the rank-size rule) for the distribution of the interaction between countries as measured by revealed comparative advantage. Using the recently developed estimator by Gabaix and...

We propose procedures for estimating the time-dependent transition matrices for the general class of finite nonhomogeneous continuous-time semi-Markov processes. We prove the existence and uniqueness of solutions for the system of Volterra integral equations defining the transition matrices,...

This paper presents the parallel computing implementation of the MitISEM algorithm, labeled Parallel MitISEM. The basic MitISEM algorithm, introduced by Hoogerheide, Opschoor and Van Dijk (2012), provides an automatic and flexible method to approximate a non-elliptical target density using...

The system GMM estimator for dynamic panel data models combines moment conditions for the model in first differences with moment conditions for the model in levels. It has been shown to improve on the GMM estimator in the first differenced model in terms of bias and root mean squared error....

Approximation formulae are developed for the bias of ordinary andgeneralized Least Squares Dummy Variable (LSDV) estimators in dynamicpanel data models. Results from Kiviet (1995, 1999) are extended tohigher-order dynamic panel data models with general covariancestructure. The focus is on...

Through Monte Carlo experiments the small sample behavior is examinedof various inference techniques for dynamic panel data models whenboth the time-series and cross-section dimensions of the data set aresmall. The LSDV technique and corrected versions of it are comparedwith IV and GMM...

The finite sample behaviour is analysed of particular least squares (LS) andmethod of moments (MM) estimators in panel data models with individual effectsand both a lagged dependent variabIe regressor and another explanatory variabIewhich may be affected by lagged feedbacks from the dependent...

The relative magnitudes are compared of successive terms in a higher-order asymptotic expansion of the bias of the LSDV estimator in dynamic panels. We find that the leading term accounts for the major part of the actual bias in small samples. This implies that bias correction procedures can be...

We propose a new estimator, the thresholded scaled Lasso, in high dimensional threshold regressions. First, we establish an upper bound on the l∞ estimation error of the scaled Lasso estimator of Lee et al. (2012). This is a non-trivial task as the literature on high-dimensional models has...

An attempt is made to set rules for a fair and fruitful competition between alternative inference methods based on their performance in simulation experiments. This leads to a list of eight methodologic aspirations. Against their background we criticize aspects of many simulation studies that...