Publications by Year: 2009

2009
AMELIA II: A Program for Missing Data
James Honaker, Gary King, and Matthew Blackwell. 2009. “AMELIA II: A Program for Missing Data”.Abstract
This program multiply imputes missing data in cross-sectional, time series, and time series cross-sectional data sets. It includes a Windows version (no knowledge of R required), and a version that works with R either from the command line or via a GUI.
CEM: Coarsened Exact Matching in Stata
Matthew Blackwell, Stefano Iacus, Gary King, and Giuseppe Porro. 2009. “CEM: Coarsened Exact Matching in Stata.” The Stata Journal, 9, Pp. 524–546.Abstract
In this article, we introduce a Stata implementation of coarsened exact matching, a new method for improving the estimation of causal effects by reducing imbalance in covariates between treated and control groups. Coarsened exact matching is faster, is easier to use and understand, requires fewer assumptions, is more easily automated, and possesses more attractive statistical properties for many applications than do existing matching methods. In coarsened exact matching, users temporarily coarsen their data, exact match on these coarsened data, and then run their analysis on the uncoarsened, matched data. Coarsened exact matching bounds the degree of model dependence and causal effect estimation error by ex ante user choice, is monotonic imbalance bounding (so that reducing the maximum imbalance on one variable has no effect on others), does not require a separate procedure to restrict data to common support, meets the congruence principle, is approximately invariant to measurement error, balances all nonlinearities and interactions in sample (i.e., not merely in expectation), and works with multiply imputed datasets. Other matching methods inherit many of the coarsened exact matching method’s properties when applied to further match data preprocessed by coarsened exact matching. The cem command implements the coarsened exact matching algorithm in Stata.
Article
CEM: Coarsened Exact Matching Software
Stefano Iacus, Gary King, and Giuseppe Porro. 2009. “CEM: Coarsened Exact Matching Software”.
CEM: Software for Coarsened Exact Matching
Stefano M Iacus, Gary King, and Giuseppe Porro. 2009. “CEM: Software for Coarsened Exact Matching.” Journal of Statistical Software, 30. Publisher's VersionAbstract

This program is designed to improve causal inference via a method of matching that is widely applicable in observational data and easy to understand and use (if you understand how to draw a histogram, you will understand this method). The program implements the coarsened exact matching (CEM) algorithm, described below. CEM may be used alone or in combination with any existing matching method. This algorithm, and its statistical properties, are described in Iacus, King, and Porro (2008).

Article
The Changing Evidence Base of Social Science Research
Gary King. 2009. “The Changing Evidence Base of Social Science Research.” In The Future of Political Science: 100 Perspectives, edited by Gary King, Kay Schlozman, and Norman Nie. New York: Routledge Press.Abstract

This (two-page) article argues that the evidence base of political science and the related social sciences are beginning an underappreciated but historic change.

Chapter PDF
Computational Social Science
David Lazer, Alex Pentland, Lada Adamic, Sinan Aral, Albert-Laszlo Barabasi, Devon Brewer, Nicholas Christakis, Noshir Contractor, James Fowler, Myron Gutmann, Tony Jebara, Gary King, Michael Macy, Deb Roy, and Marshall Van Alstyne. 2009. “Computational Social Science.” Science, 323, Pp. 721-723.Abstract

A field is emerging that leverages the capacity to collect and analyze data at a scale that may reveal patterns of individual and group behaviors.

Article
Gary King and Langche Zeng. 2009. “Empirical versus Theoretical Claims about Extreme Counterfactuals: A Response.” Political Analysis, 17, Pp. 107-112.Abstract

In response to the data-based measures of model dependence proposed in King and Zeng (2006), Sambanis and Michaelides (2008) propose alternative measures that rely upon assumptions untestable in observational data. If these assumptions are correct, then their measures are appropriate and ours, based solely on the empirical data, may be too conservative. If instead and as is usually the case, the researcher is not certain of the precise functional form of the data generating process, the distribution from which the data are drawn, and the applicability of these modeling assumptions to new counterfactuals, then the data-based measures proposed in King and Zeng (2006) are much preferred. After all, the point of model dependence checks is to verify empirically, rather than to stipulate by assumption, the effects of modeling assumptions on counterfactual inferences.

The Essential Role of Pair Matching in Cluster-Randomized Experiments, with Application to the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Evaluation
Kosuke Imai, Gary King, and Clayton Nall. 2009. “The Essential Role of Pair Matching in Cluster-Randomized Experiments, with Application to the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Evaluation.” Statistical Science, 24, Pp. 29–53.Abstract
A basic feature of many field experiments is that investigators are only able to randomize clusters of individuals–-such as households, communities, firms, medical practices, schools, or classrooms–-even when the individual is the unit of interest. To recoup the resulting efficiency loss, some studies pair similar clusters and randomize treatment within pairs. However, many other studies avoid pairing, in part because of claims in the literature, echoed by clinical trials standards organizations, that this matched-pair, cluster-randomization design has serious problems. We argue that all such claims are unfounded. We also prove that the estimator recommended for this design in the literature is unbiased only in situations when matching is unnecessary and and its standard error is also invalid. To overcome this problem without modeling assumptions, we develop a simple design-based estimator with much improved statistical properties. We also propose a model-based approach that includes some of the benefits of our design-based estimator as well as the estimator in the literature. Our methods also address individual-level noncompliance, which is common in applications but not allowed for in most existing methods. We show that from the perspective of bias, efficiency, power, robustness, or research costs, and in large or small samples, pairing should be used in cluster-randomized experiments whenever feasible and failing to do so is equivalent to discarding a considerable fraction of one’s data. We develop these techniques in the context of a randomized evaluation we are conducting of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Program.
Article
The Future of Political Science: 100 Perspectives
Gary King, Kay Schlozman, and Norman Nie. 2009. The Future of Political Science: 100 Perspectives. New York: Routledge Press.
Matched Pairs and the Future of Cluster-Randomized Experiments: A Rejoinder
Kosuke Imai, Gary King, and Clayton Nall. 2009. “Matched Pairs and the Future of Cluster-Randomized Experiments: A Rejoinder.” Statistical Science, 24, Pp. 64–72.Abstract

A basic feature of many field experiments is that investigators are only able to randomize clusters of individuals–-such as households, communities, firms, medical practices, schools, or classrooms–-even when the individual is the unit of interest. To recoup the resulting efficiency loss, some studies pair similar clusters and randomize treatment within pairs. However, many other studies avoid pairing, in part because of claims in the literature, echoed by clinical trials standards organizations, that this matched-pair, cluster-randomization design has serious problems. We argue that all such claims are unfounded. We also prove that the estimator recommended for this design in the literature is unbiased only in situations when matching is unnecessary and and its standard error is also invalid. To overcome this problem without modeling assumptions, we develop a simple design-based estimator with much improved statistical properties. We also propose a model-based approach that includes some of the benefits of our design-based estimator as well as the estimator in the literature. Our methods also address individual-level noncompliance, which is common in applications but not allowed for in most existing methods. We show that from the perspective of bias, efficiency, power, robustness, or research costs, and in large or small samples, pairing should be used in cluster-randomized experiments whenever feasible and failing to do so is equivalent to discarding a considerable fraction of one’s data. We develop these techniques in the context of a randomized evaluation we are conducting of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Program.

Article
Gary King. 2009. “OpenScholar”.
From Preserving the Past to Preserving the Future: The Data-PASS Project and the Challenges of Preserving Digital Social Science Data
Myron P Gutmann, Mark Abrahamson, Margaret O Adams, Micah Altman, Caroline Arms, Kenneth Bollen, Michael Carlson, Jonathan Crabtree, Darrell Donakowski, Gary King, Jaret Lyle, Marc Maynard, Amy Pienta, Richard Rockwell, Lois Rocms-Ferrara, and Copeland H Young. 2009. “From Preserving the Past to Preserving the Future: The Data-PASS Project and the Challenges of Preserving Digital Social Science Data.” Library Trends, 57, Pp. 315–337.Abstract

Social science data are an unusual part of the past, present, and future of digital preservation. They are both an unqualified success, due to long-lived and sustainable archival organizations, and in need of further development because not all digital content is being preserved. This article is about the Data Preservation Alliance for Social Sciences (Data-PASS), a project supported by the National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program (NDIIPP), which is a partnership of five major U.S. social science data archives. Broadly speaking, Data-PASS has the goal of ensuring that at-risk social science data are identified, acquired, and preserved, and that we have a future-oriented organization that could collaborate on those preservation tasks for the future. Throughout the life of the Data-PASS project we have worked to identify digital materials that have never been systematically archived, and to appraise and acquire them. As the project has progressed, however, it has increasingly turned its attention from identifying and acquiring legacy and at-risk social science data to identifying on going and future research projects that will produce data. This article is about the project's history, with an emphasis on the issues that underlay the transition from looking backward to looking forward.

Article
Preserving Quantitative Research-Elicited Data for Longitudinal Analysis.  New Developments in Archiving Survey Data in the U.S.
Mark Abrahamson, Kenneth A Bollen, Myron P Gutmann, Gary King, and Amy Pienta. 2009. “Preserving Quantitative Research-Elicited Data for Longitudinal Analysis. New Developments in Archiving Survey Data in the U.S.” Historical Social Research, 34, 3, Pp. 51-59.Abstract

Social science data collected in the United States, both historically and at present, have often not been placed in any public archive -- even when the data collection was supported by government grants. The availability of the data for future use is, therefore, in jeopardy. Enforcing archiving norms may be the only way to increase data preservation and availability in the future.

Article
Public Policy for the Poor? A Randomised Assessment of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Programme
Gary King, Emmanuela Gakidou, Kosuke Imai, Jason Lakin, Ryan T Moore, Clayton Nall, Nirmala Ravishankar, Manett Vargas, Martha María Téllez-Rojo, Juan Eugenio Hernández Ávila, Mauricio Hernández Ávila, and Héctor Hernández Llamas. 2009. “Public Policy for the Poor? A Randomised Assessment of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Programme.” The Lancet, 373, Pp. 1447-1454.Abstract

Background: We assessed aspects of Seguro Popular, a programme aimed to deliver health insurance, regular and preventive medical care, medicines, and health facilities to 50 million uninsured Mexicans. Methods: We randomly assigned treatment within 74 matched pairs of health clusters–-i.e., health facility catchment areas–-representing 118,569 households in seven Mexican states, and measured outcomes in a 2005 baseline survey (August 2005, to September 2005) and follow-up survey 10 months later (July 2006, to August 2006) in 50 pairs (n=32 515). The treatment consisted of encouragement to enrol in a health-insurance programme and upgraded medical facilities. Participant states also received funds to improve health facilities and to provide medications for services in treated clusters. We estimated intention to treat and complier average causal effects non-parametrically. Findings: Intention-to-treat estimates indicated a 23% reduction from baseline in catastrophic expenditures (1·9% points and 95% CI 0·14-3·66). The effect in poor households was 3·0% points (0·46-5·54) and in experimental compliers was 6·5% points (1·65-11·28), 30% and 59% reductions, respectively. The intention-to-treat effect on health spending in poor households was 426 pesos (39-812), and the complier average causal effect was 915 pesos (147-1684). Contrary to expectations and previous observational research, we found no effects on medication spending, health outcomes, or utilisation. Interpretation: Programme resources reached the poor. However, the programme did not show some other effects, possibly due to the short duration of treatment (10 months). Although Seguro Popular seems to be successful at this early stage, further experiments and follow-up studies, with longer assessment periods, are needed to ascertain the long-term effects of the programme.

Article
Replication Data for: Public Policy for the Poor? A Randomised Assessment of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Programme
Gary King, Emmanuela Gakidou, Kosuke Imai, Jason Lakin, Ryan T Moore, Clayton Nall, Nirmala Ravishankar, Manett Vargas, Martha María Téllez-Rojo, Juan Eugenio Hernández Ávila, Mauricio Hernández Ávila, and Héctor Hernández Llamas. 2009. “Replication Data for: Public Policy for the Poor? A Randomised Assessment of the Mexican Universal Health Insurance Programme”. Publisher's Version