J. Human Resources 44, pp. 1-24.
ISSN/ISBN: Not available at this time. DOI: 10.3368/jhr.44.1.1
Abstract: It is 15:00 in Nairobi. Do you know where your enumerators are?? Good quality data is paramount for applied economic research. If the data are distorted, corresponding conclusions may be incorrect. We demonstrate how Benford’s law, the distribution that first digits of numbers in certain data sets should follow, can be used to test for data abnormalities. We conduct an analysis of nine commonly used datasets and find that much data from developing countries is of poor quality while data from the US seems to be of uniformly better quality. Female and male respondents give data of similar quality.
Bibtex:
@article{,
title={Detecting problems in survey data using Benford’s Law},
author={Judge, George and Schechter, Laura},
journal={Journal of Human Resources},
volume={44},
number={1},
pages={1--24},
year={2009},
publisher={University of Wisconsin Press},
DOI={10.3368/jhr.44.1.1},
}
Reference Type: Journal Article
Subject Area(s): Statistics