Lars P. Syll

Data clusters are everywhere, even in random data. Someone who looks for an explanation will inevitably find one, but a theory that fits a data cluster is not persuasive evidence. The found explanation needs to make sense, and it needs to be tested with uncontaminated data. Similarly, someone who fires enough bullets at enough targets is bound to hit​ one. A researcher who tests hundreds of theories is bound to find evidence supporting at least one. Such evidence is...

Empirical economics and statistical power How credible is empirical economics? Is empirical economics adequately powered? Many suspect that statistical power is routinely low in empirical economics. However, to date, there has been no large-scale survey of statistical power widely across empirical economics. The main objectives of this article are to fill this gap, investigate the implications of low power on the magnitude of likely bias and recommend...

Economic history — a victim of economics imperialism Economic history was one of the first fields to succumb at least partially to so-called economics imperialism, the phenomenon through which the methods and models of economic theory have taken over other social scientific subject fields.  The economic historian’s craft, which probably always tended to err in any case towards retrospective reassurance that things were never as bad as they appeared at the...

A recent paper by Christiano, Eichenbaum and Trabandt (C.E.T.) on Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Models (DSGEs) has generated quite a reaction in the blogosphere … Bradford Delong points out that new Keynesian models were constructed to show that old Keynesian and old Monetarist policy conclusions were relatively robust, and not blown out of the water by rational expectations … The DSGE framework was then constructed so that new Keynesians could talk to RBCites. None...

Meta-analysis — nothing but an exercise in mega-silliness Including all relevant material – good, bad, and indifferent – in meta-analysis admits the subjective judgments that meta-analysis was designed to avoid. Several problems arise in meta-analysis: regressions are often non -linear; effects are often multivariate rather than univariate; coverage can be restricted; bad studies may be included; the data summarised may not be homogeneous; grouping...

On the non-applicability of statistical models Eminent statistician David Salsburg is rightfully very critical of the way social scientists — including economists and econometricians — uncritically and without arguments have come to simply assume that they can apply probability distributions from statistical theory on their own area of research: We assume there is an abstract space of elementary things called ‘events’ … If a measure on the abstract space of...

Eric Schüldt — räddaren i nöden I dessa tider, när ljudrummet dränks i den kommersiella radions tyckmyckentrutade ordbajseri och fullständigt intetsägande pubertalflamsande tjafs, har man nästan gett upp. Men det finns ljus i mörkret. I programmet Text och musik med Eric Schüldt — som sänds på söndagsförmiddagarna i P2 mellan klockan 11 och 12 — kan man lyssna på seriös musik och en programledare som har något att säga och inte bara låter foderluckan...

Robert Lucas — nonsense on stilts In Michel De Vroey’s version of the history of macroeconomics, Robert Lucas’ declaration of the need for macroeconomics to be pursued only within ‘equilibrium discipline’ and declaring equilibrium to exist as a postulate, is hailed as a ‘Copernican revolution.’ Equilibrium is not to be considered something that characterises real economies, but rather ‘a property of the way we look at things.’ De Vroey  — approvingly —...

La double vie de Véronique  [embedded content] Advertisements

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