Empirical Bayes estimation in sampling inspection

Abstract

This paper considers an empirical Bayes approach to estimating the number of defectives in a hypergeometric distribution. It involves application of an empirical Bayes identity which has proved useful in providing simple Bayes estimates for various other models. Data on the reliability of coding the answers to questions from a household survey illustrate how an empirical Bayes estimate can be computed without knowledge of the prior distribution of the number of defectives.