We construct a simple firm-based model of global interdependence. We show how extremely strong statistical correlations can naturally develop between countries even if the interconnections between those countries remain very weak. Potential policy implications of this result are also discussed.

This paper investigates the effects of fiscal policy on economic activity, welfare, income distribution, and public finances in a dynamic general equilibrium model with a unionized labor market. The paper shows that increases to public employment, wages of public sector employees, unemployment...

The goal of this paper is to use a semiparametric reduced form model to estimate the effects of various tuition subsidies. This approach expands on the tuition subsidy example in Ichimura and Taber (2000) in a number of dimensions. It has become common practice in the empirical literature to...

In a number of semiparametric models, smoothing seems necessary in order to obtain estimates of the parametric component which are asymptotically normal and converge at parametric rate. However, smoothing can inflate the error in the normal approximation, so that refined approximations are of...

The generalized method of moments estimator may be substantially biased in finite samples, especially so when there are large numbers of unconditional moment conditions. This paper develops a class of first order equivalent semi-parametric efficient estimators and tests for conditional moment...

This paper provides weak conditions under which there is nonparametric interval identification of local features of a structural function which depends on a discrete endogenous variable and is nonseparable in a latent variate. The function may deliver values of a discrete or continuous outcome...

Recent work by Schennach (2005) has opened the way to a Bayesian treatment of quantile regression. Her method, called Bayesian exponentially tilted empirical likelihood (BETEL), provides a likelihood for data y subject only to a set of m moment conditions of the form Eg(y, θ) = 0 where θ is a...

Four alternative but related approaches to empirical evaluation of policy interventions are studied: social experiments, natural experiments, matching methods, and instrumental variables. In each case the necessary assumptions and the data requirements are considered for estimation of a number...