This book had its conception in 1975in a friendly tavern near the School of Businessand PublicAdministration at the UniversityofMissouri-Columbia. Two of the authors (Fomby and Hill) were graduate students of the third (Johnson), and were (and are) concerned about teaching econometrics effectively at the graduate level. We decided then to write a book to serve as a comprehensive text for graduate econometrics. Generally, the material included in the bookand itsorganization have been governed by the question,
Howcould the subject be best presented in a graduate class? For content, this has meant that we have tried to cover
all the bases
and yet have not attempted to be encyclopedic. The intended purpose has also affected the levelofmathematical rigor. We have tended to prove only those results that are basic and/or relatively straightforward. Proofs that would demand inordinant amounts of class time have simply been referenced. The book is intended for a two-semester course and paced to admit more extensive treatment of areas of specific interest to the instructor and students. We have great confidence in the ability, industry, and persistence of graduate students in ferreting out and understanding the omitted proofs and results. In the end, this is how one gains maturity and a fuller appreciation for the subject in any case. It is assumed that the readers of the book will have had an econometric methods course, using texts like J. Johnston’s Econometric Methods, 2nd ed.