20607 - METHODS AND TOOLS FOR POLICY ANALYSIS
Department of Social and Political Sciences
Course taught in English
Go to class group/s: 24
Course Director:
MASSIMO ANELLI
MASSIMO ANELLI
Suggested background knowledge
PREREQUISITES
Basic knowledge of algebra, statistics and of the statistical software STATA required
Mission & Content Summary
MISSION
- The course introduces students to the main tools used for data analysis and applied empirical research, focusing on identifying and estimating causal effects. Most work in empirical social sciences is about questions of cause and effect such as: Which are the economic returns of one additional year of schooling? Do democratic institutions promote economic development? Does imposing a female policy-maker through gender quotas cause a change in policy? Does raising the minimum wage cause employment to decrease? Do longer prison sentences deter crimes? While one would ideally run a randomized controlled experiment to answer these questions, this is often not possible. Therefore, special methods and techniques have been developed in social science research.
- By the end of the course, students should have a firm grasp of research designs that can lead to convincing analysis and be able to go through the multiple stages of empirical research: searching for interesting questions, devising an appropriate research design, collecting the data, and implementing the analysis.
- The course blends in some basic econometric theory, reading of empirical papers and application with STATA.
CONTENT SUMMARY
- Students who do not have an intermediate level experience with Stata and Statistics should attend the course 20684 STATA PREPARATORY COURSE and 20356 PRECORSO DI STATISTICA / STATISTICS - PREPARATORY COURSE in August before the start of this course.
- Directed Acyclic Graphs
- The ideal experiment and the potential outcomes framework.
- The simple linear regression model.
- Matching
- Instrumental variables
- Regression Discontinuity Design
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Shift-share instruments
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Panel data: fixed effects
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Difference-in-Differences
Intended Learning Outcomes (ILO)
KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING
At the end of the course student will be able to...
- Understand the main econometric methods used in empirical research.
- Identify the basic properties of estimators and the conditions under which they apply
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Understand the principles behind applied empirical methods used in the social sciences
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Structure sensible research hypotheses to answer specific research/policy questions.
APPLYING KNOWLEDGE AND UNDERSTANDING
At the end of the course student will be able to...
- Prepare and manipulate data for empirical analysis
- Choose a research design suitable for a given research question and compatible with the available data.
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Apply and code statistical software to conduct regression analyses.
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Interpret and present the findings of econometric analysis.
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Critically engage with texts and journal articles which involve empirical work, recognizing the problems encountered when dealing with data in practice.
Teaching methods
- Lectures
- Practical Exercises
- Collaborative Works / Assignments
DETAILS
- Each teaching session will contemporaneously blend in basic econometric theory, a discussion of empirical papers and practical applications with STATA.
- The course syllabus will contain information on required readings, including a number of research papers.
- Students will be randomly assigned to groups to develop a simple research project. We will provide a set of readily available datasets. Groups will autonomously identify a research question suitable for the data and then choose empirical methods effective to answer the research question.
- Students will learn how to effectively summarize their research process and present their research project in class in front of their peers.
- Students will write a paper draft summarizing their project
Assessment methods
| Continuous assessment | Partial exams | General exam | |
|---|---|---|---|
|
x | x | |
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x |
ATTENDING AND NOT ATTENDING STUDENTS
Assessments will be written and taken on your laptop in person in class using Respondus browser. There will be no different format between attending and non-attending students.
Closed questions and exercises will focus on the understanding of econometric concepts, empirical evidence and intuition, as opposed to memorization of mathematical formulas. You are expected to be able to apply the empirical methods we learn in class to new empirical contexts in the exam, to read and interpret analysis outputs generated by STATA, to type STATA commands aimed at performing given analyses, to choose which method is most appropriate for a given empirical context and research question, to give policy suggestions based on given empirical evidence.
Exams will cover also STATA coding, the content of academic papers and of the in-class presentations of your classmates.
The assessment is composed of a written exam and a research project carried on in team:
- Written Exam: The exam can either be taken in two partials (first partial worth 35%, second partial 25%) or in one final exam (worth 60%) at the end of the course.
- Research project in team Research project in team is worth 40% of final score and will be evaluated with an in-class presentation of the research project plus the grading of a written draft and of the STATA code used to generate the results. Teams are randomly selected.
Teaching materials
ATTENDING AND NOT ATTENDING STUDENTS
For Students with little previous experience in empirical data analysis or for students who want to review basic statistical concepts and data analysis fundamentals, I strongly recommend to regularly refer to the following book:
A. Colin Cameron. ANALYSIS OF ECONOMICS DATA: AN INTRODUCTION TO ECONOMETRICS (2022). Hard copy available at Bocconi library and Pdf available at https://cameron.econ.ucdavis.edu/aed/ for USD 6.99
Blackboard recorded lectures and slides from 20684 STATA PREPARATORY COURSE
Blackboard recorded lectures and slides from 20356 PRECORSO DI STATISTICA / STATISTICS - PREPARATORY COURSE
Cunningham, Scott. ”Causal inference: The mixtape.” (2021). https://mixtape.scunning.com/
Additional textbooks and readings will be indicated in the detailed syllabus and during the lectures.
A useful reference for applications in Stata is the following:
Cameron, C. and P.K. Trivedi. Microeconometrics Using Stata, First or Second Edition (Stata Press 2010, 2022). Available at Bocconi library.
Last change 24/05/2024 22:53