Economic Statistics

Description

Presentation and use of economic data. Index numbers and seasonal adjustment and the business cycle.

This course will cover statistical procedures applicable for the analysis of economic data, will access statistical sources and apply statistical techniques. The objective is to make students familiar with common economic statistic sources; the popular techniques applied to them and give an understanding of their properties and limitations. While the course does provide a lead-in to the second semester course ECON213: “An Introduction to Econometrics” you should view the material covered here as being an integral part of your overall Economics programme.

Content: Summary statistics, higher order moments, analysis of bivariate series. Index number theory and applications. Introduction to time series analysis with applications to financial statistics. Sampling theory with applications to regression analysis. Accessing on-line statistical information on the New Zealand: the Census. Accessing on-line international statistical information from the OECD and World Bank. Survey data: introduction to techniques and issues of reliability.