Stochastic Specification and Maximum-Likelihood Estimation of the Linear Expenditure System

John Chipman and Guoqiang Tian

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: From the point of view of consumer demand theory the linear expenditure system (LES) provides a convenient model for representing consumer response to price and income and its linearity is one of its most attractive features. But when estimation problems are discussed, the descriptive adjective is more notable for its irony than its accuracy. Since Stone (1954) first calculated parameter estimates for the LES, some stochastic specifications for the system have been given. These specifications, however, ignore some of the requirements implied by economic theory and these methods of estimation lack desirable properties. This paper will deal with the problems of stochastic specification and maximum-likelihood estimation of the LES making full use of the restrictions of economic theory by assuming that the minimum required quantities for the commodities have a three-parameter multivariate lognormal distribution.

Keywords: Stochastic Specification; Maximum-Likelihood Estimation; Linear Expenditure System (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C7 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1989
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/41385/1/MPRA_paper_41385.pdf original 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:pra:mprapa:41385

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany Ludwigstraße 33, D-80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joachim Winter ().