IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/arx/papers/2106.05503.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Panel Data with Unknown Clusters

Author

Listed:
  • Yong Cai

Abstract

Clustered standard errors and approximate randomization tests are popular inference methods that allow for dependence within observations. However, they require researchers to know the cluster structure ex ante. We propose a procedure to help researchers discover clusters in panel data. Our method is based on thresholding an estimated long-run variance-covariance matrix and requires the panel to be large in the time dimension, but imposes no lower bound on the number of units. We show that our procedure recovers the true clusters with high probability with no assumptions on the cluster structure. The estimated clusters are independently of interest, but they can also be used in the approximate randomization tests or with conventional cluster-robust covariance estimators. The resulting procedures control size and have good power.

Suggested Citation

  • Yong Cai, 2021. "Panel Data with Unknown Clusters," Papers 2106.05503, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2106.05503
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://arxiv.org/pdf/2106.05503
    File Function: Latest version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hyungsik Roger Moon & Martin Weidner, 2015. "Linear Regression for Panel With Unknown Number of Factors as Interactive Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 83(4), pages 1543-1579, July.
    2. MacKinnon, James G. & Nielsen, Morten Ørregaard & Webb, Matthew D., 2023. "Testing for the appropriate level of clustering in linear regression models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 235(2), pages 2027-2056.
    3. A. Colin Cameron & Jonah B. Gelbach & Douglas L. Miller, 2008. "Bootstrap-Based Improvements for Inference with Clustered Errors," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(3), pages 414-427, August.
    4. Stéphane Bonhomme & Elena Manresa, 2015. "Grouped Patterns of Heterogeneity in Panel Data," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 83(3), pages 1147-1184, May.
    5. Rustam Ibragimov & Ulrich K. Müller, 2016. "Inference with Few Heterogeneous Clusters," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(1), pages 83-96, March.
    6. Hansen, Bruce E. & Lee, Seojeong, 2019. "Asymptotic theory for clustered samples," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 210(2), pages 268-290.
    7. Alberto Abadie & Susan Athey & Guido W Imbens & Jeffrey M Wooldridge, 2023. "When Should You Adjust Standard Errors for Clustering?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 138(1), pages 1-35.
    8. Cai Yong & Canay Ivan A. & Kim Deborah & Shaikh Azeem M., 2023. "On the Implementation of Approximate Randomization Tests in Linear Models with a Small Number of Clusters," Journal of Econometric Methods, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 85-103, January.
    9. Ivan A. Canay & Joseph P. Romano & Azeem M. Shaikh, 2017. "Randomization Tests Under an Approximate Symmetry Assumption," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 85, pages 1013-1030, May.
    10. Yong Cai, 2021. "A Modified Randomization Test for the Level of Clustering," Papers 2105.01008, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    11. Marianne Bertrand & Esther Duflo & Sendhil Mullainathan, 2004. "How Much Should We Trust Differences-In-Differences Estimates?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(1), pages 249-275.
    12. Jushan Bai, 2009. "Panel Data Models With Interactive Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(4), pages 1229-1279, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. MacKinnon, James G. & Nielsen, Morten Ørregaard & Webb, Matthew D., 2023. "Cluster-robust inference: A guide to empirical practice," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 232(2), pages 272-299.
    2. MacKinnon, James G. & Nielsen, Morten Ørregaard & Webb, Matthew D., 2023. "Testing for the appropriate level of clustering in linear regression models," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 235(2), pages 2027-2056.
    3. Yong Cai, 2021. "A Modified Randomization Test for the Level of Clustering," Papers 2105.01008, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2022.
    4. Michael P. Leung, 2023. "Network Cluster‐Robust Inference," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 91(2), pages 641-667, March.
    5. Dmitry Arkhangelsky & Guido Imbens, 2023. "Causal Models for Longitudinal and Panel Data: A Survey," Papers 2311.15458, arXiv.org, revised Mar 2024.
    6. Michael P. Leung, 2022. "Dependence‐robust inference using resampled statistics," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 37(2), pages 270-285, March.
    7. Bruno Ferman, 2023. "Inference in difference‐in‐differences: How much should we trust in independent clusters?," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 38(3), pages 358-369, April.
    8. Roth, Jonathan & Sant’Anna, Pedro H.C. & Bilinski, Alyssa & Poe, John, 2023. "What’s trending in difference-in-differences? A synthesis of the recent econometrics literature," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 235(2), pages 2218-2244.
    9. Hwang, Jungbin, 2021. "Simple and trustworthy cluster-robust GMM inference," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 222(2), pages 993-1023.
    10. James G. MacKinnon & Matthew D. Webb, 2020. "When and How to Deal with Clustered Errors in Regression Models," Working Paper 1421, Economics Department, Queen's University.
    11. Luis Alvarez & Bruno Ferman, 2020. "Inference in Difference-in-Differences with Few Treated Units and Spatial Correlation," Papers 2006.16997, arXiv.org, revised Apr 2023.
    12. Hagemann, Andreas, 2019. "Placebo inference on treatment effects when the number of clusters is small," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 213(1), pages 190-209.
    13. Hansen, Christian & Liao, Yuan, 2019. "The Factor-Lasso And K-Step Bootstrap Approach For Inference In High-Dimensional Economic Applications," Econometric Theory, Cambridge University Press, vol. 35(3), pages 465-509, June.
    14. Wang, Wenjie, 2021. "Wild Bootstrap for Instrumental Variables Regression with Weak Instruments and Few Clusters," MPRA Paper 106227, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Hansen, Bruce E. & Lee, Seojeong, 2019. "Asymptotic theory for clustered samples," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 210(2), pages 268-290.
    16. Cai Yong & Canay Ivan A. & Kim Deborah & Shaikh Azeem M., 2023. "On the Implementation of Approximate Randomization Tests in Linear Models with a Small Number of Clusters," Journal of Econometric Methods, De Gruyter, vol. 12(1), pages 85-103, January.
    17. Tom Boot & Gianmaria Niccodemi & Tom Wansbeek, 2023. "Unbiased estimation of the OLS covariance matrix when the errors are clustered," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 64(6), pages 2511-2533, June.
    18. Ivan A. Canay & Andres Santos & Azeem M. Shaikh, 2018. "The wild bootstrap with a "small" number of "large" clusters," CeMMAP working papers CWP27/18, Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    19. Yong Cai, 2021. "Some Finite Sample Properties of the Sign Test," Papers 2103.01412, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2024.
    20. Timothy Conley & Silvia Gonçalves & Christian Hansen, 2018. "Inference with Dependent Data in Accounting and Finance Applications," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 56(4), pages 1139-1203, September.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2106.05503. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: arXiv administrators (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://arxiv.org/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.