Interpret Coefficient of OLS Regression

[Stefan Illich]

Dear all,
i have the output of a standard OLS regression but I am having troubles to economically interpret the coefficients.
The setting is as follows: my y var is a Count Variable. (Number), my x var is tax in %. for eg 25.00. The coefficient is –.097
I would like to get a general interpretation of this coefficient, like: if x increases by 1% y decreases on average by ...%.

Thank you for your help.
Regards, Stefan

[Emad Shehata]

Check this page
http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/stata/o...son_output.htm
These are the estimated Poisson regression coefficients for the model. Recall that the dependent variable is a count variable, and Poisson regression models the log of the expected count as a function of the predictor variables. We can interpret the Poisson regression coefficient as follows:

for a one unit change in the predictor variable, the difference in the logs of expected counts is expected to change by the respective regression coefficient, given the other predictor variables in the model are held constant.

[Dick Campbell]

You have not run a Poisson regression, you've run OLS. Your independent variable is interpreted in terms of percentage points. Thus, a one percentage point increase in the tax variable decreases the fitted value of the count by .0976078. In all likelihood however, OLS is not the appropriate specification of your model. You likely need either Poisson or perhaps negative binomial.