BS1112: Statistics for Economics Assignment Brief 2025 | AU

Assessment:	Report	Academic year:	2025
Count words:	1,200 words	Module code:	BS1112

BS1112 Introduction

Key skills required by economists are to be able to gather the correct data from a reliable source and load it into Excel to analyse it further. For example, data has to be summarised with descriptive statistics and analysed using different statistical test procedures. For this Coursework, you will have to evidence all of these skills.

This assignment consists of two reports. The first report involves extracting and analysing time-series data from the OECD webpage. It is worth 50% of the assignment mark. The second report involves analysing cross-sectional data from the Worldbank. The second report will be worth 50% of the assignment mark.

BS1112 Module Learning Outcomes Assessed:

• Show an understanding of descriptive and inferential statistics and be able to apply these techniques to the analysis and presentation of data.
• Apply statistical methods to basic economics scenarios using basic software for statistical analysis.
• Gather data from secondary sources and describe and analyse these data using statistical techniques.
• Communicate statistical concepts and results in a clear and precise manner

Assessment Weighting For The Module:

75 per cent of the overall module mark

BS1112 Assessment Criteria:

See Assessment Matrix on Blackboard

2 Information About Submission:

The assignment should be uploaded onto Turnitin before the deadline specified in the teaching. The submission deadline is 02/05/2025 at noon. A hard copy does not have to be submitted. You will need to produce your work in a single Word document. This will mean that any data and charts you produce in Excel will need to be imported (copied) into Word. I strongly recommend to upload a pdf version of your report onto Turnitin to ensure that all graphs and tables are correctly displayed. Furthermore, Turnitin only accepts pdf or word (.doc/.docx) documents. Any other formats cannot be opened and will receive a mark of 0.

3 Report Structure of BS1112 

The report should include the following sections:

• Title page
• Table of contents
• Report 1 (Time-series)
• Report 2 (Cross-section)

More information on the structure of Report 1 and 2 is provided below.

As this coursework is a report, you are encouraged to use sub-headings.

Font size and line spacing: Use 1.5 linespacing and a font size of 12 to facilitate reading, otherwise I will soon require stronger glasses!

Referencing: You have to use consistent referencing and add a reference section at the end (after the conclusion but before the appendix). Please use British Harvard Style referencing. Aston University has an excellent guide on referencing: Click here.

Word limit: max 1,200 words (+/- 10%). Note that the word count does not include references, captions, equations, the appendix, or text within tables and charts. However, the title page, and the section headers do count. There is no page limit, only a word limit.

4 Report 1: Time-Series Analysis (50%)

You are asked to prepare a statistical brief about the yearly development of the United Kingdom government fiscal balance for the period 2007 to 2022. You will have to compare the development in the UK with one other country. Do not choose the other country randomly – you will have to provide a justification why you think that the comparison is of interest for a general audience.

Report Format And Layout

Make sure that Report 1 contains the following sections:

• Introduction
• Main Body (Descriptive Statistics and Hypothesis Tests)
• Conclusion
• References
• Appendix

The work should be neat and tidy and easy to read. It is very important to use a consistent reference style for both in-text citations and the list of references displayed at the end of the report. Any data downloaded and any Excel commands used should go into the appendix. The appendix has to be presented neatly, so do not just copy and paste the data from the statistical webpage. The appendix is not a substitute for clear explanations of the main part of your work. There is no page limit for the appendix.

You Will Have To Complete The Following Tasks:

BS1112 Task 1 – Data Collection

Download the following data from `Government at a Glance – yearly updates’ section of the OECD website and save it in an Excel spreadsheet:

• ‘General government fiscal balance as a percentage of GDP’ for the UK for the period 2007 to 2022.
• ‘General government fiscal balance as a percentage of GDP’ ‘for another country of your choice for the period 2007 to 2022. You have to
• select a country for which data is available over the whole time period, without any gaps.
• Add all the raw data into the appendix of Part 1. Do not forget to present the data in a user-friendly way.

BS1112 Task 2 – Calculations And Descriptive Statistics

Calculate the yearly change in the fiscal balance for the UK and your other chosen country. The formula for changes is:∆FBt = FBt − FBt−1 (1)
Add the column / row of government fiscal balance changes to your raw dataset in the appendix. Using Excel, calculate and present numeric descriptive statistics (Number of Observations, Mean, Median, Max, Min, Std. Dev. and Skewness) for the government fiscal balance and changes in the government fiscal balance for the UK and your other chosen country. The descriptive statistics table has to be presented in the main body of your report.

BS1112 Task 3 – Graphical Methods

You have to produce three charts:

Create one chart that compares the government fiscal balance for the period 2007 to 2022 of the UK with the other country you have selected.
Create one chart that compares changes in the government fiscal balance for the period 2007 to 2022 of the UK with the other country you have selected.

Create one chart that compares the mean government fiscal balance of the UK and the other country that you have selected You have to choose the chart type which you think is most appropriate. Charts have to be clearly labelled and presented. The charts have to be included in the main body of the report.

BS1112 Task 4 – Hypothesis Tests

Now undertake 2 hypothesis tests. For your tests, assume that the population distributions of the government fiscal balance variables are normal:

Using a one-sample hypothesis test, test the claim that the UK average government fiscal balance over the time period is -4.5% using a 5% significance level.

Using a comparison of means test, test if the average government fiscal balance in the UK and in the country of your choice are the same using a 5% significance level.

BS1112 Task 5 – Write A Statistical Brief

Use the charts, the numerical descriptive statistics and the hypothesis-test results to write a report on the development of the yearly UK government fiscal balance since 2007. You have to describe your charts, numerical descriptive statistics as well as your hypothesis tests and carefully explain your findings. Good answers will be able to link the observations with economic theory. Include the following in each section of the report:

Introduction:

Provide an outline of the topic of your report and highlight its relevance. Also, justify the selection of the other country (word limit: 50).

Main Body:

This part contains your analysis and interpretation of your findings. All charts, the descriptive statistics table and your hypothesis-test results have to be presented in this section. You have to state the test hypothesis and critical values for your tests. Do not use bullet points – this is a report not a power point presentation (word limit: 500).

Conclusion:

Conclude your report by summarising your findings, provide an outlook for further investigations and / or policy recommendations (word limit: 50).

References:

Add a reference section at the end of the report conforming to the (British) Harvard-style referencing. Present here all the source you have used throughout this report.

Appendix:

Include all the raw data in this section. Ensure that the data is well presented. Add here also any formulas and commands you have used to generate your statistics.

The overall formatting of the report, e.g. how the references and the data in the appendix are presented, is worth 10 marks.

5 Report 2: Cross-Section Analysis (50%)

This part is worth 50% of the overall assignment mark. You are asked to prepare a statistical brief about the relationship between CO2 emissions and growth in GDP of 182 different countries. You will use data for ONE specific year. The year you are going to use will depend on the first letter of your surname (see look-up table below):

First letter of surname    Year of analysis
A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J,    2017
K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R,    2018
S, T U, V, W, X, Y, Z    2019

For example, if your surname were Thompson, you would use data for the year 2019. If your surname were Guest, your relevant year would be2017.

I have already downloaded and cleaned the data for you. I sourced both variables from Worldbank’s World Development Indicator Database1. To ensure that every student has the same number of observations, countries that have a missing observation at any point between 2017 to 2019 were dropped. On Blackboard, you can find the complete CO2.xlsx panel dataset that contains data for the period 2017 to 2019.

You have to modify this dataset. Keep only data that is relevant for your analysis. I.e. delete any CO2 and gGDP variables that are from different years. For example, student Guest needs data only for the year 2017. He therefore drops the variables CO22018 and gGDP2018, …, gGDP2019. Table 1 summarises the variables of the dataset.

Table 1: Variable description

• Variable    Variable descriptor
• Country    Country name
• CO2    CO2 emissions (kg per 2017 PPP $ of GDP)
• gGDP    GDP growth (annual %)
  
• CO2 emissions captures the carbon dioxide emissions (kg per 2017 PPP $ of GDP).

PPP stands for purchasing power parity which allows for ease of comparison between the different countries. Carbon dioxide emissions are those emissions that come from the burning of fossil fuels and the manufacture of cement. The growth in GDP is the annual percentage growth rate of GDP at market prices based on constant local currency. GDP is the sum of gross value added by all resident producers in the economy plus any product from taxes and minus any subsidies not included in the value of the products.

This report will investigate if there is a relationship between CO2 emissions and the growth in GDP.

Report 2 should have the following structure:

• Introduction
• Main Body (Descriptive Statistics and Hypothesis Tests)
• Conclusion
• References
• Appendix

Task 1 – Calculations And Descriptive Statistics

Using Excel, calculate and present numeric descriptive statistics (Number of Observations, Mean, Median, Max, Min, Std. Dev. and Skewness) for CO2 and gGDP variables. The descriptive statistics table has to be presented in the main body of your report.

Task 2 – Graphical Methods

You have to produce one chart that consists of two elements:

Produce a scatter plot that illustrates the relationship between CO2 and gGDP.
Add a best fit line to the plot.
The chart has to be clearly labelled and presented. The chart has to be included in the main body of the report.

Task 3 – Creating New Variables

Derive two categorical variables from the dataset:

1. Create a new variable called CO2Group. This new variable should have the following two categories:

• Low CO2: CO2 is smaller than or equal to 0.4 (kg per 2017 PPP $ of GDP)
• High CO2: CO2 is greater than 0.4 (kg per 2017 PPP $ of GDP)

2. Create a new variable called gGDPGroup. This new variable should have the following three categories:

• Contraction gGDP: gGDP is smaller than 0%
• Moderate gGDP: gGDP is between 0% and 5% (inclusive).
• High gGDP: gGDP is greater than 5%.

3. Add the two new variables to your data set. Add the function you have used to generate the new variables to the Appendix.

Task 4 – Hypothesis Tests

Now undertake 2 hypothesis tests

Using a χ2 test, show if there is a statistical relationship between the categorical CO2Group and gGDPGroup variables using a 5% significance level. Advice: You will have to generate a Pivot table which you can use as a foundation for undertaking your test.
Generate a correlation coefficient between your numerical CO2 and gGDP variables. Using a t-test, show if the correlation coefficient is statistically significant at the 5% significance level.

Task 5 – Write A Statistical Brief

Use the charts, the numerical descriptive statistics and the hypothesis-test results to write a report on the relationship between CO2 emissions and growth in GDP. You have to describe your charts, numerical descriptive statistics as well as your hypothesis tests and carefully explain your findings. Good answers will be able to link the observations with economic theory. Include the following in each section of the report:

Introduction:

Provide an outline of the topic of your report and highlight its relevance (word limit: 50).

Main Body:

This part contains your analysis and interpretation of your findings. All charts, the descriptive statistics table and your hypothesis test results have to be presented in this section. You have to state the test hypothesis and critical values for your tests. Include here also your tables that you have generated for undertaking the χ2 test. Do not use bullet points – this is a report not a power point presentation (word limit: 500).

Conclusion:

Conclude your report by summarising your findings, provide an outlook for further investigations and / or policy recommendations (word limit: 50).

References:

Add a reference section at the end of the report conforming to the (British) Harvard-style referencing. Present here all the source you have used throughout this report.

Appendix:

Include all the raw data (incl. the new variables you have generated) in this section. Ensure that the data is well presented. Add here also any formulas and commands you have used to generate your statistics.

The overall formatting of the report, e.g. how the references and the data in the appendix are presented, is worth 10 marks.