How many types are there?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Crawford, Ian; Pendakur, Krishna
• 署名单位: University of Oxford; University of London; London School Economics & Political Science; Simon Fraser University
• 刊物名称: ECONOMIC JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0013-0133
• DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0297.2012.02545.x
• 发表日期: 2013
• 页码: 77-95
• 关键词: nonparametric-estimation; demand systems; models; number; assumptions; tests

摘要

We consider a revealed preference-based method that will bound the minimal partition of consumer microdata into a set of preference types such that the data are perfectly rationalisable by standard utility theory. This provides a simple, non-parametric and theory-driven way of investigating unobserved preference heterogeneity in empirical data, and easily extends to any choice model which has a revealed preference characterisation. We illustrate the approach using survey data and find that the number of types is remarkably few relative to the sample size only four or five types are necessary to fully rationalise all observed choices in a data set with 500 observations of choice vectors.