TY  - JOUR
AU  - Einav, Liran
AU  - Levin, Jonathan D
TI  - The Data Revolution and Economic Analysis
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 19035
PY  - 2013
Y2  - May 2013
DO  - 10.3386/w19035
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w19035
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w19035.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Liran Einav
Stanford University
Department of Economics
579 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA  94305-6072
Tel: 650/723-3704
Fax: 650/725-5702
E-Mail: leinav@stanford.edu

Jonathan D. Levin
Graduate School of Business
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305-7298
Tel: 650/723-5962
E-Mail: jdlevin@stanford.edu
M1  - published as Liran Einav, Jonathan Levin. "The Data Revolution and Economic Analysis," in Josh Lerner and Scott Stern, editors, "Innovation Policy and the Economy, Volume 14" University of Chicago Press (2014)

M3  - presented at "Innovation Policy and the Economy 2013", April 23, 2013
AB  - Many believe that "big data" will transform business, government and other aspects of the economy. In this article we discuss how new data may impact economic policy and economic research. Large-scale administrative datasets and proprietary private sector data can greatly improve the way we measure, track and describe economic activity. They also can enable novel research designs that allow researchers to trace the consequences of different events or policies. We outline some of the challenges in accessing and making use of these data. We also consider whether the big data predictive modeling tools that have emerged in statistics and computer science may prove useful in economics.
ER  -