English

The covariance of causal effect estimators for binary v-structures

Statistics Theory 2025-03-19 v1 Statistics Theory

Abstract

Previously [Journal of Causal Inference, 10, 90-105 (2022)], we computed the variance of two estimators of causal effects for a v-structure of binary variables. Here we show that a linear combination of these estimators has lower variance than either. Furthermore, we show that this holds also when the treatment variable is block randomised with a predefined number receiving treatment, with analogous results to when it is sampled randomly.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2503.14242,
  title  = {The covariance of causal effect estimators for binary v-structures},
  author = {Jack Kuipers and Giusi Moffa},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2503.14242},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

6 page technical report with 2 figures and 8 pages of supplementary appendices (with 3 more figures)

R2 v1 2026-06-28T22:25:15.413Z