Richard Spady worked on a number of topics in econometrics and industrial organization during the year. His work on empirical likelihood, partly in collaboration with S Corcoran and A Davison of the Statistics Department (Oxford), resulted in econometrics seminars at the University of Chicago, Universidad de Madrid Carlos III, and Bristol University, and a presentation at the September meeting of the Royal Statistical Society. Progress during the year included the extension of the underlying theory to semiparametric models in which the number of moment conditions exceeds the number of parameters. This yields improved estimation and inference in contexts now handled by the 'Generalized Method of Moments' which is used widely in both micro- and macro-economics. This work has been undertaken in collaboration with G Imbens (Harvard) who visited the College in March.
He also started work, primarily with A Chesher (Bristol), on an ESRC-funded project on 'Microeconometric Methods in the Analysis of Survey Data' and with an Oxford team (led by J Vickers) on another ESRC project on 'Competition and Competition Policy for Firms with Market Power'. With K Graddy (Jesus College) he started an empirical analysis of the effect of exchange-rate fluctuations on the pricing behaviour of exporting firms in oligopolistic markets, with the first data collected on US and UK cigarette producers.