A computationally fast estimator for random coefficients logit demand models using aggregate data
提出一种近似BLP的快速估计量ABLP，通过线性近似市场占有率函数实现解析反演，在大数据集中与BLP等价且计算更快。
This article proposes a computationally fast estimator for random coefficients logit demand models using aggregate data that Berry, Levinsohn, and Pakes ( ; hereinafter, BLP) suggest. Our method, which we call approximate BLP (ABLP), is based on a linear approximation of market share functions. The computational advantages of ABLP include (i) the linear approximation enables us to adopt an analytic inversion of the market share equations instead of a numerical inversion that BLP propose, (ii) ABLP solves the market share equations only at the optimum, and (iii) it minimizes over a typically small dimensional parameter space. We show that the ABLP estimator is equivalent to the BLP estimator in large data sets. Our Monte Carlo experiments illustrate that ABLP is faster than other approaches, especially for large data sets.