We show that hedonic price indexes may be biased when not all product characteristics are observed. We derive two primary sources of bias. The first is a classical selection problem that arises due to changes over time in the values of unobserved characteristics. The second comes from changes in the implicit prices of unobserved characteristics. Next, we show that the bias can be corrected for under fairly general assumptions using extensions of factor analysis methods. We test our methods empirically using a new comprehensive monthly data set for desktop personal computer systems. For this data we find that the standard hedonic index has a slight upward bias of approximately 1.4\% per year. We also find that omitting an important characteristic (CPU benchmark) causes a large bias in the index with standard methods, but that this bias is essentially eliminated when the proposed correction is applied.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
file. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version under "Related research" (further below) or search for a different version of it.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number
9980.
Length: Date of creation: Sep 2003 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:9980
Note: IO PR Contact details of provider: Postal: National Bureau of Economic Research, 1050 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A. Phone: 617-868-3900 Email: Web page: http://www.nber.org More information through EDIRC
For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its listing, contact: ().
Related research
Keywords:
Find related papers by JEL classification: E3 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles C1 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods: General
This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:
Cited by: (explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)