The Effects of Conditional Admissions on Earnings

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Conditional on where people were admitted, they do about equally well. Conditional on that, it looks like a good experiment in the sense that people who went to different sorts of schools have similar family backgrounds and they have similar measures of ability. Of course, it isn't really a randomized trial, but we can tell that it looks very well controlled because we can see that after appropriate conditioning.

Joshua Angrist of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology talks to EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the craft of econometrics--how to use economic thinking and statistical methods to make sense of data and uncover causation. Angrist argues that improvements in research design along with various econometric techniques have improved the credibility of measurement in a complex world. Roberts pushes back and the conversation concludes with a discussion of how to assess the reliability of findings in controversial public policy areas.