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arXiv:1907.07271stat.ME

Potential Outcome and Directed Acyclic Graph Approaches to Causality: Relevance for Empirical Practice in Economics

Guido W. Imbens

Abstract

In this essay I discuss potential outcome and graphical approaches to causality, and their relevance for empirical work in economics. I review some of the work on directed acyclic graphs, including the recent "The Book of Why," by Pearl and MacKenzie. I also discuss the potential outcome framework developed by Rubin and coauthors, building on work by Neyman. I then discuss the relative merits of these approaches for empirical work in economics, focusing on the questions each answer well, and why much of the the work in economics is closer in spirit to the potential outcome framework.

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stat.MEMethodology (Statistics)

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  1. Review: The Book of Why 1 comment

    • For more on this, you might enjoy this survey of Pearl's work, and its relevance to economics research, by Guido Imbens: https://arxiv.org/abs/1907.07271. It is long, but through. The conclusion is essentially that Pearl is over-hyped, though my summary does significant violence…

      spekcularView on HNParent context

  2. The Book of Why: The New Science of Cause and Effect [pdf] 2 comments

    • Recognizing that not many will care about my opinion on the subject, I will link to this excellent (and IMO accurate) paper by Guido Imbens: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1907.07271.pdf One of the problems in groups is that there is a belief that the loudest and most self-confident…

      bachmeierView on HNParent context

    • I'll try to dig it up, saw it a while ago on a forum. Another thing might be that in Rubin's framework it's immediately straightforward to do semi-parametric estimation and get consistency and all that. I'd say in practice that's probably not the first thing to do for DAGs…

      zwapsView on HNParent context

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