Dr Daniel Sturm and Dr Gregory Fischer LRB.R537

This course is compulsory on the Executive MPA. This course is not available as an outside option.

There are no formal pre-requisites, but recommended advance reading is given below.  A familiarity with basic statistical concepts and basic calculus are very useful.

The course introduces students to the quantitative evaluation of public policies. The focus of the course will be on practical applications of state of the art approaches to test the effectiveness of public policy interventions. The course begins with an overview over the key benefits of randomized experiments in the evaluation of public policies. Next the course covers a number of techniques that are widely used in the evaluation of public policies, including difference in differences regressions, regression discontinuity approaches, matching and concludes with a brief introduction to cost-benefit analysis.

A one-week modular teaching block.

One mock examination will be provided.

Particularly useful textbooks for background reading is James Stock & Mark Watson, Introduction to Econometrics; The material in the textbooks will be complemented with recent research papers and chapters from other books. A full reading list will be distributed at the beginning of the course.

Project (50%, 2000 words) and online assessment (50%).

Please note that online examinations take place on the third Friday after module teaching concludes. The project will consist of a 2,000 word data analysis exercise. Data analysis exercises are due on the sixth Friday after module teaching concludes. Further details will be provided at the Executive MPA programme induction.