Taking Stata for a Loop: -forvalues-

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It doesn’t take long for new analysts to learn that copying and pasting code really speeds up the time needed to complete any job. This seems to be especially true when you need to create groups of new variables, or when performing the same transformation to a set of fields.

The reality is that copying and pasting code in these instances is actually the long way of accomplishing a task. Sure, the code will be easy to read. But you could complete the same tasks in a fraction of the time.

Fortunately, Stata has a set of built-in tools to make this process easier.

This article will show you how to use the -forvalues- command in Stata in order to automate repetitive tasks. Learning how to use this tool will help make your data analysis code cleaner, shorter, and faster to write.