Extract: A complete system of budget share equations for U.S. food consumption was estimated using alternative specifications of the Almost Ideal Demand System (AIDS) and four food groups. The specifications accounted for habits, through a systematic change in one of the parameters, and first-order autocorrelation. The theoretical structure of the AIDS enabled the utility maximization framework to remain intact, satisfied the theoretical properties pertaining to demand systems, and provided a way to ascertain the amount that habits affected current consumption. Likelihood ratio tests indicated that both habits and autocorrelation were present.
This book is a collection of 20 chapters on chosen topics from cross-section and panel data econometrics. It explores both theoretical and practical aspects of selected cutting-edge techniques which are gaining popularity among applied econometricians, while following the motto of “keeping things simple”. Each chapter gives a basic introduction to one such method, directs readers to supplementary references, and shows an application. The book takes into account that—A: The field of econometrics is evolving very fast and leading textbooks are trying to cover some of the recent developments in revised editions. This book offers basic introduction to state-of-the-art techniques and recent advances in econometric models with detailed applications from various developing and developed countries. B: An applied researcher or practitioner may prefer reference books with a simple introduction to an advanced econometric method or model with no theorems but with a longer discussion on empirical application. Thus, an applied econometrics textbook covering these cutting-edge methods is highly warranted; a void this book attempts to fills.The book does not aim at providing a comprehensive coverage of econometric methods. The 20 chapters in this book represent only a sample of the important topics in modern econometrics, with special focus on econometrics of cross-section and panel data, while also recognizing that it is not possible to accommodate all types of models and methods even in these two categories. The book is unique as authors have also provided the theoretical background (if any) and brief literature review behind the empirical applications. It is a must-have resource for students and practitioners of modern econometrics.
This textbook addresses the core issues facing economists concerning price determination in commodity markets, especially food and agricultural commodities. This book hones in on the conceptual basis of the various relationships, with special emphasis on market interrelationships, both horizontally and vertically. This book covers key concepts such as consumer demand theory; quality, heterogeneous goods, and cross section demand; derived demand, marketing margins, and relationship between output and raw material prices; retail-to-farm demand linkages, imperfect competition, and short-run price determination; dynamic consumer demand; and dynamic models of the firm. What makes this textbook of particular use to students is its focus on bridging the gap between theory and empirical analysis. Going from theory to empirics requires that we have data—time series or cross section—that match the theoretical constructs. Often the data match is not perfect, either by definition or how the data are computed. In addition to problems of matching data with theoretical constructs, students and researchers need to know how to specify, estimate, and interpret results within the context of imperfect and often incomplete data. This textbook uses several data sets to illustrate how one might address problems in real-world settings. Furthermore, with exercises at the end of each chapter, students are able to test themselves on their ability to bring theory to life.
During 1985-86, the acquisition editor for the humanities and social sciences division of Kluwer Academic Publishers in the Netherlands visited the University of Horida (where I was also visiting while on sabbatical leave from Wilfrid Laurier University as the McKethan-Matherly Senior Research Fellow) to discuss publishing plans of the faculty. He expressed a keen interest in publishing the proceedings of the conference of the Canadian Econometric Study Group (CESG) that was to be held the following year at WLU. This volume is the end product of his interest, endurance, and persistence. But for his persistence I would have given up on th~ project Most of the papers (though not all) included in this volume are based on presentations at CESG conferences. In some cases scholars were invited to contribute to this volume where their research complimented those presented at these conferences even though they were not conference participants. Since papers selected for presentation at the CESG conferences are generally the finished product of scholarly research and often under submission to refereed journals, it was not possible to publish the conference proceedings in their entirety. Accordingly it was decided, in consultation with the publisher, to invite a select list of authors to submit significant extensions of the papers they presented at the CESG conferences for inclusion in this volume. The editor wishes to express gratitude to all those authors who submitted their papers for evaluation by anonymous referees and for making revisions to conform to our editorial process.
The modern system-wide approach to applied demand analysis emphasizes a unity between theory and applications. Its fIrm foundations in economic theory make it one of the most impressive areas of applied econometrics. This book presents a large number of applications of recent innovations in the area. The database used consist of about 18 annual observations for 10 commodities in 18 OECO countries (more than 3,100 data points). Such a large body of data should provide convincing evidence, one way or the other, about the validity of consumption theory. A PREVIEW OF THE BOOK The overall importance of the analysis presented in the book can be seen from the following table which shows the signifIcant contribution of the OECO to the world economy. As can be seen, the 24 member countries account for about 50 percent of world GOP in 1975. In this book we present an extensive analysis of the consumption patterns of the OECO countries.
