Julio Huato  wrote:
> Computationally, VAR is a procedure to estimate the parameters of a
> time-series model.  It's up to you to decide which parameters you
> estimate.  So, of course you can do hypothesis testing with VAR.  It
> depends on which parameters you decide to estimate.   If you have
> enough degrees of freedom (data), then you can estimate the model
> "coefficients" and higher moments as well -- as high as you wish.
> Typically, economists estimate var-covar matrices as a matter of
> routine (which gives you the weights to test your coefficients).
> Hypothesis tests for each coefficient (and for the whole model) are
> default procedure.

thanks for the clarification. However, the kind of hypothesis testing
I was referring to was the kind where you start with a theory (and
thus one or more hypotheses to be tested). The theory is then stated
as a structural equation (e.g., a consumption function). I prefer
general-to-specific modeling, in which the structural equation
includes coefficients that allow testing of competing hypothesis
(rather than letting one's prior commitment to a theory bias results).

>...  here's the way for people to
> decide on their own whether it is crude or not -- spend some time
> getting your head around the principles, then take a bunch of data and
> use it yourself!  How can it harm you?

so it's a bit like voting in a US election, i.e., harmless?
-- 
Jim Devine / "In an ugly and unhappy world the richest man can
purchase nothing but ugliness and unhappiness." -- George Bernard Shaw
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