On the Failure of the Bootstrap for Matching Estimators
| Title: | On the Failure of the Bootstrap for Matching Estimators |
| Author: |
Imbens, Guido; Abadie, Alberto
Note: Order does not necessarily reflect citation order of authors. |
| Citation: | Abadie, Alberto and Guido W. Imbens. 2008. On the failure of the bootstrap for matching estimators. Econometrica 76(6): 1537-1557. |
| Full Text & Related Files: |
imbens_bootstrap.pdf (564.3Kb; PDF) 
|
| Abstract: | Matching estimators are widely used in empirical economics for the evaluation of programs or treatments. Researchers using matching methods often apply the bootstrap to calculate the standard errors. However, no formal justification has been provided for the use of the bootstrap in this setting. In this article, we show that the standard bootstrap is, in general, not valid for matching estimators, even in the simple case with a single continuous covariate where the estimator is root-N consistent and asymptotically normally distributed with zero asymptotic bias. Valid inferential methods in this setting are the analytic asymptotic variance estimator of Abadie and Imbens (2006a) as well as certain modifications of the standard bootstrap, like the subsampling methods in Politis and Romano (1994). |
| Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.3982/ECTA6474 |
| Other Sources: | http://www3.interscience.wiley.com.ezp-prod1.hul.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/fulltext/121536265/PDFSTART |
| Terms of Use: | This article is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of-use#LAA |
| Citable link to this page: | http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:3043415 |
This item appears in the following Collection(s)
-
FAS Scholarly Articles [5133]
Peer reviewed scholarly articles from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences of Harvard University
Contact administrator regarding this item (to report mistakes or request changes)
