The work of Levine and Renelt (1992) and Sala-i-Martin (1997a, b) which attempted to test the robustness of various determinants of growth rates of per capita GDP among countries using two variants of Edward Leamer's extreme-bounds analysis is reexamined. In a realistic Monte Carlo experiment in which the universe of potential determinants is drawn from those in Levine and Renelt's study, both versions of the extreme-bounds analysis are evaluated for their ability to recover the true specification. Levine and Renelt's method is shown to have low size and extremely low power: nothing is robust; while Sala-i-Martin's method is shown to have high size and high power: it is undiscriminating. Both methods are compared to a cross-sectional version of the general-to-specific search methodology associated with the LSE approach to econometrics. It is shown to have size near nominal size and high power. Sala-i-Martin's method and the general-to-specific method are then applied to the actual data from the original two studies. The results are consistent with the Monte Carlo results and are suggestive that the factors that most affect differences of growth rates are ones that are beyond the control of policymakers.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by University of California at Davis, Department of Economics in its series Working Papers with number
01-1.
Find related papers by JEL classification: C40 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: Special Topics - - - General C80 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Data Collection and Data Estimation Methodology; Computer Programs - - - General O40 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - General
References listed on IDEAS Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
Griliches, Zvi, 1986.
"Economic data issues,"
Handbook of Econometrics,
in: Z. Griliches†& M. D. Intriligator (ed.), Handbook of Econometrics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 25, pages 1465-1514
Elsevier.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, 1996.
"The Productivity of Nations,"
NBER Working Papers
5812, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
[Downloadable!] (restricted)
Other versions:
Cited by: (explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.) This item has more than 25 citations. To prevent cluttering this page, these citations are listed on a separate page.