Treatment effects in sample selection models and their nonparametric estimation

Myoung-jae Lee

Journal of Econometrics, 2012, vol. 167, issue 2, 317-329

Abstract: In a sample-selection model with the ‘selection’ variable Q and the ‘outcome’ variable Y∗, Y∗ is observed only when Q=1. For a treatment D affecting both Q and Y∗, three effects are of interest: ‘participation’ (i.e., the selection) effect of D on Q, ‘visible performance’ (i.e., the observed outcome) effect of D on Y≡QY∗, and ‘invisible performance’ (i.e., the latent outcome) effect of D on Y∗. This paper shows the conditions under which the three effects are identified, respectively, by the three corresponding mean differences of Q, Y, and Y|Q=1 (i.e., Y∗|Q=1) across the control (D=0) and treatment (D=1) groups. Our nonparametric estimators for those effects adopt a two-sample framework and have several advantages over the usual matching methods. First, there is no need to select the number of matched observations. Second, the asymptotic distribution is easily obtained. Third, over-sampling the control/treatment group is allowed. Fourth, there is a built-in mechanism that takes into account the ‘non-overlapping support problem’, which the usual matching deals with by choosing a ‘caliper’. Fifth, a sensitivity analysis to gauge the presence of unobserved confounders is available. A simulation study is conducted to compare the proposed methods with matching methods, and a real data illustration is provided.

Keywords: Treatment effect; Sample selection; Matching; U-statistic; Sensitivity analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304407611001990
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:econom:v:167:y:2012:i:2:p:317-329

DOI: 10.1016/j.jeconom.2011.09.018

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Econometrics is currently edited by T. Amemiya, A. R. Gallant, J. F. Geweke, C. Hsiao and P. M. Robinson

More articles in Journal of Econometrics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().