Call for papers: Masterclass and Conference on Measuring Prices and Quantities

Organised by CeMMAP and ESWG

This masterclass and conference is a joint initiative of the Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice (CeMMAP) and the Economic Statistics Working Group (ESWG). The master class and conference will take place in London on 17^th and 18^th March 2020 respectively.

The masterclass on 17^th March will be taken by Prof. Erwin Diewert. The topics to be covered in the class are:

1. Basic index number theory: basket approaches and stochastic approaches
2. Axiomatic or test approaches to index number theory
3. The economic approach to index number theory
4. Multilateral index number theory and the chain drift problem
5. Quality adjustment: hedonic regression methods

This will be followed by the conference on 18^th March. Submissions  are requested on issues associated with problems of measuring prices and quantities. We welcome papers on any relevant topic including:

Use of Hedonic Methods

Utility-based indicators

Measuring the contribution of goods and services free at the point of use

Only complete papers will be considered although early versions are welcome. Authors will have fifty minutes for their presentations and may be asked to discuss another paper presented.  The total number of papers presented is not expected to exceed six. There is no conference fee but participants are expected to cover their own travel and accommodation costs. The submission deadline is 1^st December 2019 and notifications are expected by 20^th December. 

Registration for the master-class will open on 1^st December 2019

Email for submission of conference papers: martin.weale@kcl.ac.uk. Please enter ESWG Conference Submission in the subject box.

Prices

£50 Masterclass

£100 Conference but

£50 for both for students.

We would also like to say that there is no charge for paper presenters.

Erwin Diewert gained his PhD at Berkeley in 1969 where he was advised by Dan McFadden. He has been a Professor of Economics at the Vancouver School of Economics at the University of British Colombia, where he was also an undergraduate and post-graduate student, since 1970. He also holds a part-time appointment at the University of New South Wales.

His areas of interest are price measurement, the measurement of productivity and index number theory and more generally, welfare economics and applied general equilibrium modelling. His early work on index numbers was brought together in a volume of collected papers Essays in Index Number Theory. It includes “Exact and Superlative Index Numbers”, one of his best-known papers published in the Journal of Econometrics in 1976. He also introduced (with Caves and Christensen) the Malmquist productivity index and he developed and promoted the concept of the user cost of capital. Later work has focused on the problems of making price and quantity comparisons across countries and on some of the problems to be addressed in measuring capital inputs. Recent publications include work on industry productivity and cross-country convergence in the Journal of Eonometrics (2016) and an overview of innovations in measurement in economics and econometrics, also in the Journal of Econometrics (2016).

His work has found many applications in official statistics. He encouraged the adoption of chained index numbers in the national accounts, a practice which is now widespread.   He is a Member of the Royal Society of Canada, a Fellow of the Econometric Society and Chairman of the Statistics Canada Advisory Committee on Prices.

CeMMAP,  the Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice is a research centre supported by the Economic and Social Research Council. CeMMAP develops and applies methods for modelling individual behaviour, the influences on it and the impact of policy interventions.

ESWG

The Economic and Statistics Working Group was set up and is supported by the Office for National Statistics, the Royal Economic Society, the Royal Statistical Society and the Society of Professional Economists to promote research and understanding of issues associated with economic statistics.