Ch1 Woolridge: The Nature of Econometrics and Economic Data

Question 1

What is nonexperimental data?

Answer 1

data not accumulated through controlled experiments on individuals, firms. Sometimes called observational data or retrospective data

Question 2

What is experimental data?

Answer 2

data collected in labroratory environments

Question 3

What is an empirical analysis?

Answer 3

an analysis that uses data to test a theory or to estimate a relationship

Question 4

What is cross-sectional data?

Answer 4

it consists of a sample of individuals, households, firms, cities, states, countries or a variety of other units, taken at a given point in time.

Question 5

What is an important feature of cross-sectional data?

Answer 5

we can often assume that they have been obtained by random sampling from the underlying population

Question 6

What is time-series data?

Answer 6

a time series data set consists of observations on a variable or several variables over time. Examples of time series data include stock prices, money supply, GDP.

Question 7

Why is time series data more difficult to analyze than cross-sectional data?

Answer 7

economic observations can rarely be assumed to be independent across time; most economic and other time series are related to their recent histories

Question 8

What is panel data?

Answer 8

panel data (or longitudinal data) set consists of a time series for each cross-sectional member in the data set

Question 9

What distinguishes panel data from pooled cross section?

Answer 9

the same cross-sectional units are followed over a given time period