IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bno/worpap/2020_07.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Norges Bank Output Gap Estimates: Forecasting Properties, Reliability and Cyclical Sensitivity

Author

Listed:
  • Francesco Furlanetto
  • Kåre Hagelund
  • Frank Hansen
  • Ørjan Robstad

Abstract

This paper documents the suite of models used by Norges Bank to estimate the output gap. The models are estimated using data on GDP, unemployment, inflation, wages, investment, house prices and credit. We evaluate the estimated output gap series in terms of its forecasting properties, its reliability and its cyclical sensitivity to various measures of demand and supply shocks. A simple un-weighted average of the models features a better forecasting performance than each individual model. In addition, it helps predicting inflation in pseudo real-time and exhibits limited variations when new data become available. The summary measure of potential output responds strongly and rapidly to permanent shocks and to narrative measures of technology shocks but, although to a more limited extent, also to transitory shocks.

Suggested Citation

  • Francesco Furlanetto & Kåre Hagelund & Frank Hansen & Ørjan Robstad, 2020. "Norges Bank Output Gap Estimates: Forecasting Properties, Reliability and Cyclical Sensitivity," Working Paper 2020/7, Norges Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:bno:worpap:2020_07
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://hdl.handle.net/11250/2677142
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Orphanides, Athanasios & van Norden, Simon, 2005. "The Reliability of Inflation Forecasts Based on Output Gap Estimates in Real Time," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 37(3), pages 583-601, June.
    2. Blanchard, Olivier Jean & Quah, Danny, 1989. "The Dynamic Effects of Aggregate Demand and Supply Disturbances," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 79(4), pages 655-673, September.
    3. Kuttner, Kenneth N, 1994. "Estimating Potential Output as a Latent Variable," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 12(3), pages 361-368, July.
    4. Francesco Furlanetto & Ørjan Robstad & Pål Ulvedal & Antoine Lepetit, 2020. "Estimating hysteresis effects," Working Paper 2020/13, Norges Bank.
    5. Olivier Blanchard, 2018. "Should We Reject the Natural Rate Hypothesis?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 32(1), pages 97-120, Winter.
    6. Berger, Tino & Richter, Julia & Wong, Benjamin, 2022. "A unified approach for jointly estimating the business and financial cycle, and the role of financial factors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    7. Tara M. Sinclair, 2009. "The Relationships between Permanent and Transitory Movements in U.S. Output and the Unemployment Rate," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 41(2-3), pages 529-542, March.
    8. Òscar Jordà, 2005. "Estimation and Inference of Impulse Responses by Local Projections," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 161-182, March.
    9. Claudio BorioBy & Piti Disyatat & Mikael Juselius, 2017. "Rethinking potential output: embedding information about the financial cycle," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(3), pages 655-677.
    10. Athanasios Orphanides & Simon van Norden, 2002. "The Unreliability of Output-Gap Estimates in Real Time," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 84(4), pages 569-583, November.
    11. Francesco Furlanetto & Francesco Ravazzolo & Samad Sarferaz, 2019. "Identification of Financial Factors in Economic Fluctuations," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 129(617), pages 311-337.
    12. Bernhardsen, Tom & Eitrheim, Oyvind & Jore, Anne Sofie & Roisland, Oistein, 2005. "Real-time data for Norway: Challenges for monetary policy," The North American Journal of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 16(3), pages 333-349, December.
    13. James Morley & Benjamin Wong, 2020. "Estimating and accounting for the output gap with large Bayesian vector autoregressions," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(1), pages 1-18, January.
    14. A. W. Phillips, 1958. "The Relation Between Unemployment and the Rate of Change of Money Wage Rates in the United Kingdom, 1861–1957," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 25(100), pages 283-299, November.
    15. Hilde Bjørnland & Leif Brubakk & Anne Jore, 2008. "Forecasting inflation with an uncertain output gap," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 413-436, November.
    16. Oscar Jorda & Alan Taylor & Sanjay Singh, 2019. "The Long-Run Effects of Monetary Policy," 2019 Meeting Papers 1307, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    17. Apel, Mikael & Jansson, Per, 1999. "A theory-consistent system approach for estimating potential output and the NAIRU," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 271-275, September.
    18. Lawrence J. Christiano & Cosmin Ilut & Roberto Motto & Massimo Rostagno, 2010. "Monetary policy and stock market booms," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 85-145.
    19. Günes Kamber & James Morley & Benjamin Wong, 2018. "Intuitive and Reliable Estimates of the Output Gap from a Beveridge-Nelson Filter," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(3), pages 550-566, July.
    20. James D. Hamilton, 2018. "Why You Should Never Use the Hodrick-Prescott Filter," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 100(5), pages 831-843, December.
    21. Hjelm, Göran & Jönsson, Kristian, 2010. "In Search of a Method for Measuring the Output Gap of the Swedish Economy," Working Papers 115, National Institute of Economic Research.
    22. Charles A. Fleischman & John M. Roberts, 2011. "From many series, one cycle: improved estimates of the business cycle from a multivariate unobserved components model," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2011-46, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    23. Marek Jarociński & Michele Lenza, 2018. "An Inflation‐Predicting Measure of the Output Gap in the Euro Area," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 50(6), pages 1189-1224, September.
    24. Aastveit, Knut Are & Trovik, Tørres, 2014. "Estimating the output gap in real time: A factor model approach," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 180-193.
    25. Arabinda Basistha & Richard Startz, 2008. "Measuring the NAIRU with Reduced Uncertainty: A Multiple-Indicator Common-Cycle Approach," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 90(4), pages 805-811, November.
    26. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Mauricio Ulate, 2018. "The Cyclical Sensitivity in Estimates of Potential Output," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 49(2 (Fall)), pages 343-441.
    27. Francesco Furlanetto & Paolo Gelain & Marzie Taheri Sanjani, 2021. "Output Gap, Monetary Policy Trade-offs, and Financial Frictions," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 41, pages 52-70, July.
    28. Planas, Christophe & Rossi, Alessandro & Fiorentini, Gabriele, 2008. "Bayesian Analysis of the Output Gap," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 26, pages 18-32, January.
    29. Todd E. Clark & Francesco Ravazzolo, 2015. "Macroeconomic Forecasting Performance under Alternative Specifications of Time‐Varying Volatility," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 30(4), pages 551-575, June.
    30. Mikael Apel & Per Jansson, 1999. "System estimates of potential output and the NAIRU," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 24(3), pages 373-388.
    31. Ms. Sweta Chaman Saxena & Ms. Valerie Cerra, 2000. "Alternative Methods of Estimating Potential Output and the Output Gap: An Application to Sweden," IMF Working Papers 2000/059, International Monetary Fund.
    32. Domenech, Rafael & Gomez, Victor, 2006. "Estimating Potential Output, Core Inflation, and the NAIRU as Latent Variables," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 24, pages 354-365, July.
    33. Brubakk, Leif & ter Ellen, Saskia & Robstad, Ørjan & Xu, Hong, 2022. "The macroeconomic effects of forward communication," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 120(C).
    34. Clark, Peter K., 1989. "Trend reversion in real output and unemployment," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 15-32, January.
    35. Francesco Furlanetto & Paolo Gelain & Marzie Taheri Sanjani, 2021. "Output Gap, Monetary Policy Trade-offs, and Financial Frictions," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 41, pages 52-70, July.
    36. Julien Champagne & Guillaume Poulin‐Bellisle & Rodrigo Sekkel, 2018. "The Real‐Time Properties of the Bank of Canada's Staff Output Gap Estimates," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 50(6), pages 1167-1188, September.
    37. Rochelle M. Edge & Jeremy B. Rudd, 2016. "Real-Time Properties of the Federal Reserve's Output Gap," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(4), pages 785-791, October.
    38. Canova, Fabio, 2020. "FAQ: How do I extract the output gap?," Working Paper Series 386, Sveriges Riksbank (Central Bank of Sweden).
    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. Vladimir Arcabic & Frane Banic, 2021. "Characteristics of fiscal policy in Croatia: does it depend on the phase of the business cycle?," Public Sector Economics, Institute of Public Finance, vol. 45(4), pages 433-457.

    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. Francesco Furlanetto & Kåre Hagelund & Frank Hansen & Ørjan Robstad, 2023. "Norges Bank Output Gap Estimates: Forecasting Properties, Reliability, Cyclical Sensitivity and Hysteresis," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 85(1), pages 238-267, February.
    2. Chalmovianský, Jakub & Němec, Daniel, 2022. "Assessing uncertainty of output gap estimates: Evidence from Visegrad countries," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    3. Josefine Quast & Maik H. Wolters, 2022. "Reliable Real-Time Output Gap Estimates Based on a Modified Hamilton Filter," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 40(1), pages 152-168, January.
    4. Berger, Tino & Richter, Julia & Wong, Benjamin, 2022. "A unified approach for jointly estimating the business and financial cycle, and the role of financial factors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    5. Morley, James & Rodríguez-Palenzuela, Diego & Sun, Yiqiao & Wong, Benjamin, 2023. "Estimating the euro area output gap using multivariate information and addressing the COVID-19 pandemic," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    6. Berger, Tino & Richter, Julia & Wong, Benjamin, 2022. "A unified approach for jointly estimating the business and financial cycle, and the role of financial factors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    7. Kai Carstensen & Felix Kießner & Thies Rossian, 2023. "Estimation of the TFP Gap for the Largest Five EMU Countries," CESifo Working Paper Series 10245, CESifo.
    8. Thomas Hasenzagl & Filippo Pellegrino & Lucrezia Reichlin & Giovanni Ricco, 2022. "A Model of the Fed's View on Inflation," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(4), pages 686-704, October.
    9. Berger, Tino & Ochsner, Christian, 2022. "Robust real-time estimates of the German output gap based on a multivariate trend-cycle decomposition," Discussion Papers 35/2022, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    10. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Mauricio Ulate, 2018. "The Cyclical Sensitivity in Estimates of Potential Output," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 49(2 (Fall)), pages 343-441.
    11. Florian Huber & Michael Pfarrhofer & Philipp Piribauer, 2020. "A multi‐country dynamic factor model with stochastic volatility for euro area business cycle analysis," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(6), pages 911-926, September.
    12. Mr. Jiaqian Chen & Lucyna Gornicka, 2020. "Measuring Output Gap: Is It Worth Your Time?," IMF Working Papers 2020/024, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Camila Figueroa & Jorge Fornero & Pablo García, 2019. "Hindsight vs. Real time measurement of the output gap: Implications for the Phillips curve in the Chilean Case," Working Papers Central Bank of Chile 854, Central Bank of Chile.
    14. Marko Melolinna & Máté Tóth, 2019. "Output gaps, inflation and financial cycles in the UK," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 56(3), pages 1039-1070, March.
    15. Fatás, Antonio & Singh, Sanjay R., 2024. "Supply or demand? Policy makers’ confusion in the presence of hysteresis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    16. Michael O’Grady, 2019. "Estimating the Output, Inflation and Unemployment Gaps in Ireland using Bayesian Model Averaging," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 50(1), pages 35-76.
    17. Olivier Coibion & Yuriy Gorodnichenko & Mauricio Ulate, 2017. "Secular Stagnation: Policy Options and the Cyclical Sensitivity in Estimates of Potential Output," Working Papers 01/2017, National Bank of Ukraine.
    18. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/784ilbkihi9tkblnh7q2514823 is not listed on IDEAS
    19. 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.
    20. Mr. Alvar Kangur & Koralai Kirabaeva & Jean-Marc Natal & Simon Voigts, 2019. "How Informative Are Real Time Output Gap Estimates in Europe?," IMF Working Papers 2019/200, International Monetary Fund.
    21. Duarte, Cláudia & Maria, José R. & Sazedj, Sharmin, 2020. "Trends and cycles under changing economic conditions," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 126-146.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Output Gap; Forecasting Inflation; Cyclical Sensitivity; Output Gap Revisions;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C38 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Classification Methdos; Cluster Analysis; Principal Components; Factor Analysis
    • E17 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General Aggregative Models - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:bno:worpap:2020_07. 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: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/nbgovno.html .

    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.