%0 Report
        %A Kluve, Jochen
        %T On the Role of Counterfactuals in Inferring Causal Effects of Treatments
        %D 2001
        %8 2001 Sep
        %I Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        %C Bonn
        %7 IZA Discussion Paper
        %N 354
        %U https://www.iza.org/publications/dp354
        %X Causal inference in the empirical sciences is based on counterfactuals. This paper presents the counterfactual account of causation in terms of Lewis’s possible-world semantics, and reformulates the statistical potential outcome framework and its underlying assumptions using counterfactual conditionals. I discuss varieties of causally meaningful counterfactuals for the case of a finite number of treatments, and illustrate these using a simple set-theoretical framework. The paper proceeds to examine proximity relations between possible worlds, and discusses implications for empirical practice.
        %K treatment effect
%K possible worlds
%K counterfactuals
%K Causation