We compare two approaches to using information about the signs of structural shocks at specific dates within a structural vector autoregression (SVAR): imposing ‘narrative restrictions’ (NR) on the shock signs in an otherwise set-identified SVAR; and casting the information about the shock...

We develop an optimal policy assignment rule that integrates two distinctive approaches commonly used in economics--targeting by observables and targeting through self-selection. Our method can be used with experimental or quasi-experimental data to identify who should be treated, be untreated,...

This paper presents new results on the identification of heteroskedastic structural vector autoregressive (HSVAR) models. Point identification of HSVAR models fails when some shifts in the variances of the structural shocks are suspected to be statistically indistinguishable from each other....