Price index surveys as quasi-longitudinal studies - ARCHIVED

To calculate price indexes, data on "the same item" (actually a collection of items narrowly defined) must be collected across time periods. The question arises whether such "quasi-longitudinal" data can be modeled in such a way as to shed light on what a price index is. Leading thinkers on price indexes have questioned the feasibility of using statistical modeling at all for characterizing price indexes. This paper suggests a simple state space model of price data, yielding a consumer price index that is given in terms of the parameters of the model.