Externally Valid Selection of Experimental Sites via the k-Median Problem

Jos\'e Luis Montiel Olea, Brenda Prallon, Chen Qiu, Jörg Stoye and Yiwei Sun

Papers from arXiv.org

Abstract: We present a decision-theoretic justification for viewing the question of how to best choose where to experiment in order to optimize external validity as a $k$-median problem, a popular problem in computer science and operations research. In particular, when treatment effect heterogeneity across experimental and policy-relevant sites is substantial (in a sense we make precise), we present conditions under which minimizing the worst-case, welfare-based regret among all nonrandom schemes that select $k$ sites to experiment is equivalent to solving a $k$-median problem. The connection costs in the relevant $k$-median problem are given by ex-ante bounds on worst-case voltage effects between sites, and minimizing the sum of worst-case voltage effects can be cast as a linear integer program. Two empirical applications illustrate the theoretical and computational benefits of the suggested procedure.

Date: 2024-08, Revised 2026-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2408.09187 Latest version (application/pdf)

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:arx:papers:2408.09187

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Papers from arXiv.org
Bibliographic data for series maintained by arXiv administrators ().