Volume 45, Issue 2 pp. 161-194
Free Access

Does consistent aggregation really matter?

C. Richard Shumway

C. Richard Shumway

Department of Agricultural Economics, Washington State University,

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George C. Davis

George C. Davis

Department of Agricultural Economics, Texas A&M University

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First published: 18 December 2002
Citations: 9

Abstract

Consistent aggregation ensures that behavioural properties which apply to disaggregate relationships apply also to aggregate relationships. The agricultural economics literature which has tested for consistent aggregation or measured statistical bias and/or inferential errors due to aggregation is reviewed. Tests for aggregation bias and errors of inference are conducted using indices previously tested for consistent aggregation. Failure to reject consistent aggregation in a partition did not entirely mitigate erroneous inference due to aggregation. However, inferential errors due to aggregation were small relative to errors due to incorrect functional form or failure to account for time series properties of data.

Footnotes

  • This article was prepared for presentation as the Alan Lloyd Fellow paper at the annual meeting of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, Sydney, Australia, January 2000. We would like to thank Alan Love for discussions related to this article, Maria Loureiro for her assistance with the literature review, the anonymous reviewer for constructive comments, and Sharon Baum for expert typing and editing services.
    • The full text of this article hosted at iucr.org is unavailable due to technical difficulties.