Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Effects of Sample Selection on Estimates of Economic Impacts of Outdoor Recreation

Informally Refereed

Abstract

Estimates of the economic impacts of recreation often come from spending data provided by a self-selected subset of a random sample of site visitors. The subset is frequently less than half the onsite sample. Biased vectors of per trip spending and impact estimates can result if self-selection is related to spending pattctns, and proper corrective procedures arc not employed. This paper shows a method for accounting for both sample selection and the censored nature of reported expenditures, via a Tobit model with sample selection. Results from a sample of visitors to Cumberland Island National Seashore indicate a naive (uncorrected) approach overestimates per trip visitor spending by 15 percent and economic impacts to industrial output by 10 percent.

Citation

English, Donald B.K. 1997. Effects of Sample Selection on Estimates of Economic Impacts of Outdoor Recreation. The Review of Regional Studies, Vol. 27, No. 3, Winter 1997
https://www.fs.usda.gov/research/treesearch/1518