GUIDELINES
In this report, you summarize your 3 key papers/articles and you analyze some of their strengths and weaknesses.
Make a title page with your name and a title that describes your topic. Yes, you will lose marks if you do not include a title page.
Introduction
An introduction paragraph describing the principal question you are addressing in your research.
Summary
A section for each of the three key papers/articles you selected where you provide the following:
a. Complete reference for the article and a web link.
b. Economic question(s) addressed or hypotheses tested in the paper/article.
c. Details about the data
i. Observational data or data from a controlled experiment? If the latter, was it a lab, social or field experiment?
ii. Type of data: panel/time series/cross-sectional
iii. Unit of observation: does a data point correspond to a household, a firm, an industry, a province/state, a country, etc
iv. Data source(s)
v. Years and geographic area covered
vi. Number of observations
d. Policy Relevance
e. Estimation methods (ordinary least squares, instrumental variables, diff-in-diff, etc) or simulation methods used.
f. The paper/articles key results. Note that you must tie the key results to the research question(s) you listed in part b.
g. The policy implications of these results
h. Explain how the paper/article helps answering your research question (the one you listed in your introduction).
i. A few internal strengths and weaknesses
j. A few external strengths and weaknesses
Recall that internal strengths and weaknesses refer to whether (or not) the authors conclusions are valid (unbiased) for the sample used to estimate the model. Typical weaknesses include a small sample, inaccurate measures, omitted variables, simultaneity, etc. Try to be specific as to the type of bias (over- or under-estimate) that might exist.
Recall that external strengths and weaknesses refer to whether (or not) the authors conclusions are valid (unbiased) for a different population than that from which the sample used to estimate the model was drawn. How old are the data and would one get the same estimates under current conditions? Would one get the same estimates if the sample came from a different country, province, age group, ethnic group, etc? Try to be specific as to the type of bias (over- or under-estimate) that might exist.
