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Investigating the inefficiency of the CBO’s budgetary projections

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  • Arai, Natsuki

Abstract

This paper evaluates the efficiency of budgetary projections issued by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) from 1984 to 2016 and investigates the cause of their inefficiency. The efficiency of both its budgetary and macroeconomic projections is rejected in many cases, especially for revenue projections. A comparison of forecast evaluations suggests that the inefficiency of revenue projections is likely due to the inefficiency of the underlying macroeconomic projections. By adjusting budgetary projections by the CBO in real time using macroeconomic forecasts by the Survey of Professional Forecasters, the accuracy of the former projections can be significantly improved in some cases, by up to 26% in terms of the root-mean-square prediction error.

Suggested Citation

  • Arai, Natsuki, 2020. "Investigating the inefficiency of the CBO’s budgetary projections," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 36(4), pages 1290-1300.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:intfor:v:36:y:2020:i:4:p:1290-1300
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijforecast.2019.12.008
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