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Regression Analysis for Ticket Sales

This document provides instructions and questions for exercises using econometric data analysis. It includes instructions to estimate equations using OLS regression to analyze factors that influence years of education, wage, house prices, birth weight, and other variables. It asks questions about interpreting coefficients, adding and omitting variables, and whether estimates change substantially based on model specification. Students are asked to estimate models, report and interpret results, and check whether adding or omitting variables affects coefficient estimates.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
20 views3 pages

Regression Analysis for Ticket Sales

This document provides instructions and questions for exercises using econometric data analysis. It includes instructions to estimate equations using OLS regression to analyze factors that influence years of education, wage, house prices, birth weight, and other variables. It asks questions about interpreting coefficients, adding and omitting variables, and whether estimates change substantially based on model specification. Students are asked to estimate models, report and interpret results, and check whether adding or omitting variables affects coefficient estimates.

Uploaded by

upb553118
Copyright
© All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Exercises Chapter 3 (Numbers as in the Wooldridge textbook)

2
The data in [Link] on working men was used to estimate the following equation:
d = 10.36 − 0.094 sibs + 0.131 meduc + 0.210 f educ
educ

n = 722
R2 = 0.214,
where educ is years of schooling, sibs is number of siblings, meduc is mother’s years of education,
and feduc is father’s years of schooling.

(i) Does sibs have the expected effect? Explain. Holding meduc and feduc fixed, by how
much does sibs have to increase to reduce predicted years of education by one year?
(A noninteger answer is acceptable here.)

(ii) Discuss the interpretation of the coefficient on meduc.

(iii) Suppose that Man A has no siblings, and his mother and father each have 12 years of
education. Man B has no siblings, and his mother and father each have 16 years of
education. What is the predicted difference in years of education between B and A?

5
In a study relating college grade point average to time spent in various activities, you distribute
a survey to several students. The students are asked how many hours they spend each week
in four activities: studying, sleeping, working, and leisure. Any activity is put into one of the
four categories, so that for each student, the sum of hours in the four activities must be 168.

(i) In the model

GP A = β0 + β1 study + β2 sleep + β3 work + β4 leisure + u,

does it make sense to hold sleep, work, and leisure fixed, while changing study?

(ii) Explain why this model violates Assumption MLR.3.

(iii) How could you reformulate the model so that its parameters have a useful interpretation
and it satisfies Assumption MLR.3?

7
Which of the following can cause OLS estimators to be biased?

(i) Heteroskedasticity.

(ii) Omitting an important variable.

(iii) A sample correlation coefficient of 0.95 between two independent variables both included
in the model.

1
8
Suppose that average worker productivity at manufacturing firms (avgprod) depends on two
factors, average hours of training (avgtrain) and average worker ability (avgabil):

avgprod = β0 + β1 avgtrain + β2 avgabil + u.

Assume that this equation satisfies the Gauss-Markov assumptions. If grants have been given to
firms whose workers have less than average ability, so that avgtrain and avgabil are negatively
correlated, what is the likely bias in β˜1 obtained from the simple regression of avgprod on
avgtrain?

C1
A problem of interest to health officials (and others) is to determine the effects of smoking
during pregnancy on infant health. One measure of infant health is birth weight; a birth
weight that is too low can put an infant at risk for contracting various illnesses. Since factors
other than cigarette smoking that affect birth weight are likely to be correlated with smoking,
we should take those factors into account. For example, higher income generally results in
access to better prenatal care, as well as better nutrition for the mother. An equation that
recognizes this is
bwght = β0 + β1 cigs + β2 f aminc + u.

(i) What is the most likely sign for β2 ?

(ii) Do you think cigs and faminc are likely to be correlated? Explain why the correlation
might be positive or negative.

(iii) Now, estimate the equation with and without faminc, using data in [Link]. Re-
port the results in equation form, including the sample size and R-squared. Discuss your
results, focusing on whether adding faminc substantially changes the estimated effect of
cigs on bwght.

C2
Use the data in [Link] to estimate the model

price = β0 + β1 sqrf t + β2 bdrms + u,

where price is the house price measured in thousands of dollars.

(i) Write out the results in equation from.

(ii) What is the estimated increase in price for a house with one more bedroom, holding
square footage constant?

(iii) What is the estimated increase in price for a house with an additional bedroom that is
140 square feet in size? Compare this to your answer in part (ii).

(iv) What percentage of the variation in price is explained by square footage and number of
bedrooms?

2
(v) The first house in the sample has sqrf t = 2, 438 and bdrms = 4. Find the predicted
selling price for this house from the OLS regression line.

(vi) The actual selling price of the first house in the sample was $300,000 (so price = 300).
Find the residual for this house. Does it suggest that the buyer underpaid or overpaid
for the house?

(vii) Run a simple regression where price is only regressed on bdrms and compare the bdrms-
coefficient from this regression with βˆ2 (from part ii). Now confirm the partialling out
interpretation of OLS estimates by following the partialling out procedure. This first
requires regressing bdrms on sqrft and saving the residuals, rˆ1 . Then regress price on rˆ1
and compare the coefficient on rˆ1 with β̂2 .

C6
Use the data set in [Link] for this problem. As usual, be sure all of the following
regressions contain an intercept.

(i) Run a simple regression of IQ on educ to obtain the slope coefficient, say, δ˜1 .

(ii) Run the simple regression of log(wage) on educ, and obtain the slope coefficient, β˜1 .

(iii) Run the regression of log(wage) on educ and IQ, and obtain the slope coefficients, βˆ1 and
βˆ2 , respectively.

(iv) Verify that β˜1 = βˆ1 + βˆ2 δ˜1 .

C7
Use [Link] to answer this question.

(i) Estimate the model

log(bwght) = β0 + β1 cigs + β2 npvis + u,

and report the results in the usual form, including the sample size and R-squared. Are
the signs of the slope coefficients what you expected? Explain.

(ii) If npvis increases by one sample standard deviation, what is the estimated effect on birth
weight?

(iii) Now run the simple regression of log(bwght) on cigs, and compare the slope coefficient
with the estimate obtained in part (i). Is the estimated effect of cigarette smoking much
different than in part (i)?

(iv) Find the correlation between cigs and npvis and use it to explain the similarity of the
simple and multiple regression estimates of β1 .

(v) Add the variables mage, meduc, fage, and feduc to the regression from part (i). Is birth
weight [more precisely log(bwght)] an easy variable to explain?

Common questions

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Holding sleep, work, and leisure fixed while changing study hours is problematic because it violates the constraint that the sum of hours in all activities must equal 168. This implies an unrealistic scenario where time can be added to study without subtracting from other activities, thus potentially leading to multicollinearity or omitted variable bias .

Square footage and the number of bedrooms are primary determinants of housing prices. Their coefficients in regression models quantify the expected change in price with each unit change of these variables. For example, if a bedroom's coefficient is significantly positive, it indicates that adding a bedroom increases the price, holding square footage constant. Meanwhile, interpreting the R-squared value allows understanding the proportion of price variation these variables explain together .

Considering simultaneous impacts of multiple variables helps us achieve an accurate representation of causal relationships. In microeconomic data, impacts are rarely isolated, and various factors often influence outcomes like wages, education, and health. Including relevant variables controls for confounding effects, reduces biases, and enhances the precision of estimates, providing a clearer, more robust understanding of the phenomenon under study .

Adding family income to the regression model allows us to isolate the effect of cigarette smoking from the effect of family income on birth weight. It helps reduce omitted variable bias and determines whether the initial effect of smoking was overstated due to its correlation with family income. If the coefficient on smoking changes significantly with the inclusion of family income, it highlights the bias present in the simpler model .

Omitting family income, which is likely correlated with smoking, could bias the estimated coefficient on cigarette smoking. Family income might be positively correlated with access to healthcare and negatively correlated with smoking habits. Omitting it might inflate the negative effect attributed purely to cigarettes, as family income could contribute to better infant health outcomes independently of smoking .

The correlation between cigarette smoking and family income is likely negative; higher family income generally leads to better access to resources and lower smoking rates during pregnancy. This negative correlation might suggest that smokers tend to come from lower-income backgrounds. Therefore, controlling for family income is crucial in estimating the true impact of smoking on birth weight to prevent attributing income-related effects to smoking .

OLS estimators can be biased by omitting an important variable. This omitted variable bias arises when a variable that influences the dependent variable is left out, causing the other coefficients to capture its effects. Heteroskedasticity and a high correlation between independent variables do not inherently cause bias, although they can lead to inefficiencies and multicollinearity issues, respectively .

The partialling out approach is useful because it isolates the unique variation of an independent variable, removing the influence of other variables. This ensures that the coefficient represents its true impact on the dependent variable, free from confounding effects. By comparing the coefficients after partial regression, we verify whether adjustments in the model structure lead to different conclusions about relationships between variables .

The coefficient for sibs is -0.094, indicating that an increase in the number of siblings is associated with a decrease in the predicted years of education. Holding other factors constant, for every additional sibling, the predicted years of education decreases by approximately 0.094 years. To reduce predicted education by one year, sibs must increase by approximately 10.64 (1 divided by 0.094).

Assumptions in regression models, such as linearity, independence, and homoscedasticity, ensure the unbiasedness, consistency, and efficiency of OLS estimates. Violations, such as multicollinearity or heteroskedasticity, introduce biases and inefficiencies or inflate standard errors, leading to unreliable inference. Identifying and addressing these violations, potentially through model reformulation or robust standard errors, is crucial for valid data interpretation .

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