The Tempered Ordered Probit (TOP) model with an application to monetary policy

We propose a Tempered Ordered Probit (TOP) model. Our contribution lies not only in explicitly accounting for an excessive number of observations in a given choice category - as is the case in the standard literature on in?ated models; rather, we introduce a new econometric model which nests the recently developed Middle In?ated Ordered Probit (MIOP) models of Bagozzi and Mukherjee (2012) and Brooks, Harris, and Spencer (2012) as a special case, and further, can be used as a speci?cation test of the MIOP, where the implicit test is described as being one of symmetry versus asymmetry. In our application, which exploits a panel data-set containing the votes of Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) members, we show that the TOP model a¤ords the econometrician considerable ?exibility with respect to modelling the impact of di¤erent forms of uncertainty on interest rate decisions. Our ?ndings, we argue, reveal MPC members? asymmetric attitudes towards uncertainty and the changeability of interest rates.