Application of Robust Regression and Bootstrapping in Purchasing Power Parity Analysis

Abstract

This article is an attempt to show how robust regression, a computer based statistical technique introduced by P.J.Huber in 1973 and later developed by Rousseeuw (1984), Rousseeuw and Yohai (1984), and many others, can helps us in cases where OLS totally fails due to outliers, leverage points and non-normality of error distribution. To infer from the estimators obtained from robust regression we generally need, especially for small samples, bootstrapping (resampling) technique that is also a computer intensive statistical technique introduced by Efron (1979), and later developed in many directions. This talk illustrates the whole thing by an example using data extracted from the Big Mac. Index with a purchasing power parity analysis.