st: controlling display formats in macros

["Campbell, Richard T." <dcamp@uic.edu>]

For teaching purposes, I am using lfit to run some
regression models with graphic displays. I want to
capture the slope value and display it in the title
for the graph. I capture the value of the slope in
a variable and set a local macro to the value of that
variable. I then insert the value of the macro in
the title line as in title (slope is `slope'). This
works nicely except that the slope value is printed to
about 18 decimal places.

Here is the code.

reg ln_wage = ttl_exp
matrix slope = e(b)
gen b11 = slope[1,1]
format b11 %4.3f
local b1 = b11
twoway ///
(lfit ln_wage ttl_exp, lcolor(black) lwidth(medthick)), ///
    	 title (Wages regressed on labor force experience) ///
	 subtitle (slope = `b1')

I can't attach the graph, but as I said, the value of b1
in the subtitle (last line above) displays 18 digits. Is
there some way to control this display format?






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