THE BIAS OF THE MULTIPLIER MATRIX WHEN SUPPLY AND USE TABLES ARE STOCHASTIC

The literature on stochastic input--output (I--O) analysis has paid considerable attention to the bias in the Leontief inverse. This paper extends previous studies by assuming supply and use tables (SUTs rather than I--O tables or input coefficients matrices) to be stochastic. This is a natural starting point because SUTs have become the basic data sources for I--O applications. In a Monte Carlo simulation experiment, a given SUT is randomized in two different ways and the effects are determined for eight different multiplier matrices. The analysis is carried out for Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Germany and Finland, using their SUTs for 2006. The findings indicate that, in general, biases are statistically significant but negligibly small. This corroborates earlier findings obtained for stochastic I--O tables.