Estimation of empirical models for margins of exports with unknown non-linear functional forms: A Kernel-Regularized Least Squares (KRLS) approach Evidence from eight European countries

Joachim Wagner ()
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Joachim Wagner: Leuphana Universität Lüneburg, Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre and Kiel Centre for Globalization

No 424, Working Paper Series in Economics from University of Lüneburg, Institute of Economics

Abstract: Empirical models for intensive or extensive margins of trade that relate measures of exports to firm characteristics are usually estimated by variants of (generalized) linear models. Usually, the firm characteristics that explain these export margins enter the empirical model in linear form, sometimes augmented by quadratic terms or higher order polynomials, or interaction terms, to take care or test for non-linear relationships. If these non-linear relationships do matter and if they are ignored in the specification of the empirical model this leads to biased results. Researchers, however, can never be sure that all possible non-linear relationships are taken care of in their chosen specifications. This note uses for the first time the Kernel-Regularized Least Squares (KRLS) estimator to deal with this issue in empirical models for margins of exports. KRLS is a machine learning method that learns the functional form from the data. Empirical examples show that it is easy to apply and works well. Therefore, it is considered as a useful addition to the box of tools of empirical trade economists.

Keywords: Margins of exports; empirical models; non-linear relationships; kernel-regularized least squares; krls (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: F14 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 16 pages
Date: 2024-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ecm and nep-int
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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