Join the Michigan SUG for their NEXT MEETING - An Online Webinar!
Date: Thursday, November 18, 2021 Time: Noon - 1:00 PM ET Place: Online- register here! Webinar link will be sent out on Wednesday, November 17 to those who have registered. Cost: Free! Agenda Haste Makes Waste: Don't Ruin Your Reputation With Hasty Regression - Steven Myers, University of Akron How do you know if your data is lying to you? The answer lies in following ethical, applied econometric rules and being aware of and avoiding pitfalls in regression practice. These essential skills are not typically taught in single-semester econometric (or regression) course. This presentation will discuss hasty regression and demonstrates why it represents a terrible testing strategy leading to unsubstantiated and false conclusions. A baseline regression includes a dummy variable for the treatment. The hypothesis is that the dummy variable when true (or on, or equal to 1) represents a statistically significant change in the outcome measure of the dependent variable. A simple data set is used to illustrate that the initial insignificant result is dead wrong. And in the end, it has an outsized and positive effect that is superior to alternative specifications. None of this would be known if the analyst stopped after the false signal of that first hasty regression. PROC REG and its TEST statement are used to perform nested Wald-type F-tests. Multiple specifications are shown to each be significant. SGPLOTS of results and residuals help to understand the process. The outcomes follow a quadratic path with no role for the treatment variable or there’s a clear structural break because of the treatment. To test one model against the other, non-nested hypothesis testing is used. Ramsey RESET misspecification tests in PROC AUTOREG and regression selection processes within PROC REG are employed. About the presenter: Dr. Steven Myers is an evangelist for economists in data science and the 2019 SAS Distinguished Educator. An applied econometrician, he has taught SAS® programming and advanced analytics to students for four decades. He is responsible for the Joint Certificate in Economic Data Analytics awarded at The University of Akron in partnership with SAS since 2015. Dr. Myers’ students are highly placed in data science careers locally and nationally. He was the first CIO of UA splitting time between production computing and overseeing exciting developments in academic computing including web presence, tech-enhanced classrooms, distance learning, and faculty support. He writes at LinkedIn and at EconDataScience.com, where “economics puts the science into data science.” MSUG is always looking for speakers for future meetings - please contact them if you are interested in presenting! The MSUG 2021 1-Day Conference has been postponed to June 9, 2022. Please save the date, and join them at Schoolcraft College in Livonia!
