Syllabus
Lecture 1 (Tuesday, February 20, 12:30) - Introduction to the course, example of an empirical analysis inspired by one research paper
Lecture 2 (Tuesday, February 27, 12:30) – Microeconometric analysis - data sources, usual empirical problems, introduction to identification strategiesLecture 3 (Tuesday, March 5, 12:30) - Controlled experiments
Seminar 1 (Thursday, March 7, 15:30) - Discussion of experiments, Introduction to Stata
Lecture 4 (Tuesday, March 12, 15:30) - Natural experiments I - difference-in-differences estimation
Lecture 5 (Tuesday, March 19, 12:30) - Difference-in-differences continued - triple difference, robustness
Seminar 2 (Thursday, March 21, 15:30) - Applying difference-in-differences in practice
Lecture 6 (Tuesday, March 26, 12:30) - Synthetic control function
Lecture 7 (Tuesday, April 2, 12:30) - Natural experiments II - natural experiments as instruments
Seminar 3 (Thursday, April 4, 15:30) - Applying synthetic control function in practice
Lecture 8 (Tuesday, April 9, 12:30) - Further issues with instrumental variable estimation
Seminar 4 (Thursday, April 11, 15:30) - instrumental variable estimation in Stata, checking quality of instruments
Lecture 9 (Tuesday, April 16, 12:30) - Regression discontinuity - sharp
Lecture 10 (Tuesday, April 23, 12:30) – Regression discontinuity - fuzzy
Seminar 5 (Thursday, April 25, 15:30) - applying regression discontinuity in practice - randomization checks, method choice, etc.Lecture 11 (Tuesday, April 30, 12:30) – Matching models Lecture 12 (Tuesday, May 7, 12:30) - Matching models
Seminar 6 (Thursday, May 9, 15:30) – matching models in practice
Thursday, May 16 (15:30), Tuesday, May 21 (12:30), Thursday, May 23 (15:30) – Student presentations: final projects
Annotation
- Are you writing or plan to write an applied Master's thesis using cross-sectional data?
- Do you know that correlation does not imply causation, but do not know how to identify causality?
- Do you like connecting Econometrics and economic theory?
During the Applied Microeconometrics course you will learn how to let the data talk and will get familiar with several econometric methods useful for estimating causal effects of individuals', firms' or states' decisions. For example:
"Did the marketing campaign increase firm's profits?... or was it just implemented at the time when firm's profits were rising?"
"What was the effect of introducing joint taxation of married couples?"
"Did limitation of cigarettes advertising lead to less smoking?... or would the incidence of smoking fall even without this policy?
"Do incumbent politicians have an advantage over runner-ups?... or voters chose them in previous elections and will choose them again simply because they are better?
"Does studying at a high quality college lead to higher earnings?... or is it just that students from richer families can afford better colleges?"