IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/intfor/v35y2019i3p1131-1142.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do IMF forecasts respect Okun’s law? Evidence for advanced and developing economies

Author

Listed:
  • An, Zidong
  • Ball, Laurence
  • Jalles, Joao
  • Loungani, Prakash

Abstract

This paper provides an assessment of the IMF’s unemployment forecasts, which have not received much scrutiny to date. The focus is on the internal consistency of the IMF’s growth and unemployment forecasts, and specifically on seeing whether the relationship between the two is consistent with the relationship in the data, i.e., with Okun’s Law. We find that the average performance is good, in the sense that the relationship between growth and unemployment forecasts is fairly comparable to that which prevails in the data: on average, the Okun coefficient in the forecasts mirrors the Okun coefficient in the data. Nevertheless, there is room for improvement, particularly in the year-ahead forecasts and for the group of middle-income countries. We show that a linear combination of Okun-based unemployment forecasts and WEO unemployment forecasts can deliver significant gains in forecast accuracy for developing economies.

Suggested Citation

  • An, Zidong & Ball, Laurence & Jalles, Joao & Loungani, Prakash, 2019. "Do IMF forecasts respect Okun’s law? Evidence for advanced and developing economies," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 1131-1142.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:intfor:v:35:y:2019:i:3:p:1131-1142
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijforecast.2019.03.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0169207019300494
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ijforecast.2019.03.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Tara M. Sinclair & H. O. Stekler & Warren Carnow, 2012. "A new approach for evaluating economic forecasts," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 32(3), pages 2332-2342.
    2. Christian Pierdzioch & Jan-Christoph Rulke & Georg Stadtmann, 2011. "Do professional economists' forecasts reflect Okun's law? Some evidence for the G7 countries," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(11), pages 1365-1373.
    3. Ball, Laurence & Jalles, João Tovar & Loungani, Prakash, 2015. "Do forecasters believe in Okun’s Law? An assessment of unemployment and output forecasts," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 176-184.
    4. Murphy, Kevin M & Topel, Robert H, 2002. "Estimation and Inference in Two-Step Econometric Models," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(1), pages 88-97, January.
    5. Karlyn Mitchell & Douglas Pearce, 2010. "Do Wall Street economists believe in Okun’s Law and the Taylor Rule?," Journal of Economics and Finance, Springer;Academy of Economics and Finance, vol. 34(2), pages 196-217, April.
    6. Eicher, Theo S. & Kuenzel, David J. & Papageorgiou, Chris & Christofides, Charis, 2019. "Forecasts in times of crises," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 35(3), pages 1143-1159.
    7. Olivier Jean Blanchard & Stanley Fischer, 1989. "Lectures on Macroeconomics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262022834, December.
    8. Blinder, Alan S, 1997. "Is There a Core of Practical Macroeconomics That We Should All Believe?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(2), pages 240-243, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Tsuchiya, Yoichi, 2023. "Assessing the World Bank’s growth forecasts," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 64-84.
    2. Tamás Kiss & Hoang Nguyen & Pär Österholm, 2023. "Modelling Okun’s law: Does non-Gaussianity matter?," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 64(5), pages 2183-2213, May.
    3. Mindaugas Butkus & Janina Seputiene, 2019. "The Output Gap and Youth Unemployment: An Analysis Based on Okun’s Law," Economies, MDPI, vol. 7(4), pages 1-17, November.
    4. Foroni, Claudia & Furlanetto, Francesco, 2022. "Explaining Deviations from Okun's Law," CEPR Discussion Papers 17369, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Gudum, Melis, 2021. "Growth Forecasts vs. Realizations: The Role of Stimulus and Stringency Measures during the Pandemic," MPRA Paper 108447, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    6. Karlsson, Sune & Österholm, Pär, 2020. "A hybrid time-varying parameter Bayesian VAR analysis of Okun’s law in the United States," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 197(C).
    7. Cuesta, Lizeth, 2020. "Impacto de la política de empleo juvenil en la disminución del desempleo en los países de la Unión Europea, período 2002-2017 [Impact of youth employment policy on the reduction of unemployment in ," MPRA Paper 111026, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 08 Aug 2021.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ball, Laurence & Jalles, João Tovar & Loungani, Prakash, 2015. "Do forecasters believe in Okun’s Law? An assessment of unemployment and output forecasts," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 176-184.
    2. Arai, Natsuki, 2023. "The FOMC’s new individual economic projections and macroeconomic theories," Journal of Banking & Finance, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    3. Casey, Eddie, 2020. "Do macroeconomic forecasters use macroeconomics to forecast?," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 1439-1453.
    4. Oliver Hutengs & Georg Stadtmann, 2012. "Age Effects in the Okun's Law within the Eurozone," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 1243, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    5. Glas, Alexander & Heinisch, Katja, 2021. "Conditional macroeconomic forecasts: Disagreement, revisions and forecast errors," IWH Discussion Papers 7/2021, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    6. Martin Boďa & Mariana Považanová, 2023. "How credible are Okun coefficients? The gap version of Okun’s law for G7 economies," Economic Change and Restructuring, Springer, vol. 56(3), pages 1467-1514, June.
    7. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/2961 is not listed on IDEAS
    8. Jérôme Creel & Henri Sterdyniak, 1999. "La politique monétaire sans monnaie," Revue de l'OFCE, Programme National Persée, vol. 70(1), pages 111-153.
    9. Shabir Mohsin Hashmi & Ali Gul Khushik & Muhammad Akram Gilal & Zhao Yongliang, 2021. "The Impact of GDP and Its Expenditure Components on Unemployment Within BRICS Countries: Evidence of Okun’s Law From Aggregate and Disaggregated Approaches," SAGE Open, , vol. 11(2), pages 21582440211, June.
    10. Dräger, L. & Lamla, M.J. & Pfajfar, D., 2013. "Are Consumer Expectations Theory-Consistent? The Role of Macroeconomic Determinants and Central Bank Communication," Other publications TiSEM 4d696071-8776-4191-a84f-f, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    11. Robert Boyer, 1998. "De « La Théorie Générale » à la Nouvelle Économie Classique : Une réflexion sur la nouveauté en macroéconomie," Cahiers d'Économie Politique, Programme National Persée, vol. 33(1), pages 7-56.
    12. Porras-Arena, M. Sylvina & Martín-Román, Ángel L., 2023. "The heterogeneity of Okun's law: A metaregression analysis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 128(C).
    13. Jochen O. Mierau & Mark Mink, 2018. "A Descriptive Model of Banking and Aggregate Demand," De Economist, Springer, vol. 166(2), pages 207-237, June.
    14. Dräger, Lena & Lamla, Michael J. & Pfajfar, Damjan, 2016. "Are survey expectations theory-consistent? The role of central bank communication and news," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 84-111.
    15. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/2961 is not listed on IDEAS
    16. Rodrigo Melo Gois & Marco Antonio Jorge, 2017. "Investigating the Okun’s Law in Brazil and three of its Metropolitan Areas," Revista de Economia Mackenzie (REM), Mackenzie Presbyterian University, Social and Applied Sciences Center, vol. 14(1), pages 24-58, January-J.
    17. Hutengs, Oliver & Stadtmann, Georg, 2012. "Age effects in the Okun's law within the Eurozone," Discussion Papers 322, European University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder), Department of Business Administration and Economics.
    18. Eicher, Theo S. & Rollinson, Yuan Gao, 2023. "The accuracy of IMF crises nowcasts," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 431-449.
    19. Rülke, Jan-Christoph, 2012. "Do professional forecasters apply the Phillips curve and Okun's law? Evidence from six Asian-Pacific countries," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 24(4), pages 317-324.
    20. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/2961 is not listed on IDEAS
    21. Pierdzioch, Christian & Rülke, Jan-Christoph & Stadtmann, Georg, 2012. "Who believes in the Taylor principle? Evidence from the Livingston survey," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 117(1), pages 96-98.
    22. Nektarios A. Michail, 2019. "Examining The Stability Of Okun'S Coefficient," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 71(3), pages 240-256, July.
    23. Driver, Ciaran & Muñoz-Bugarin, Jair, 2019. "Financial constraints on investment: Effects of firm size and the financial crisis," Research in International Business and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 47(C), pages 441-457.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:intfor:v:35:y:2019:i:3:p:1131-1142. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ijforecast .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.