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Early Warning or Just Wise After the Event?

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Author Info
Andrew Hughes Hallet
Rasmus Kattai
John Lewis

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Abstract

The effectiveness of cyclically adjusted balances (CABs) as an indicator of the health of public finances depends on the accuracy with which cyclically adjusted figures can be calculated in real time. This paper measures the accuracy of such figures using a specially constructed real time dataset containing published values of deficits, output gaps and cyclically adjusted deficits from successive issues of OECD economic outlook. We find that data revisions are so great that real time CABs have low power in detecting fiscal slippages as defined by the ex post data. We find that the around half of the real time errors in CABs can be attributed to revisions in the cyclical component of the budget balance, and around one half to revisions in the deficit to GDP ratio across vintages.

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Paper provided by Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department in its series DNB Working Papers with number 124.

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Date of creation: Jan 2007
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Handle: RePEc:dnb:dnbwpp:124

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  1. Beetsma, Roel & Giuliodori, Massimo, 2007. "On the Relationship between Fiscal Plans in the European Union: An Empirical Analysis Based on Real-Time Data," CEPR Discussion Papers 6088, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  2. Giavazzi, Francesco & Jappelli, Tullio & Pagano, Marco, 2000. "Searching for Non-Linear Effects of Fiscal Policy: Evidence from Industrial and Developing Countries," CEPR Discussion Papers 2374, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  3. J. de Haan & H. Berger & D. Jansen, 2003. "The end of the stability and growth pact?," WO Research Memoranda (discontinued) 748, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department. [Downloadable!]
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  4. Lorenzo Forni & Sandro Momigliano, 2004. "Cyclical sensitivity of fiscal policies based on real-time data," Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) 540, Bank of Italy, Economic Research Department. [Downloadable!]
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  5. St-Amant, P. & van Norden, S., 1997. "Measurement of the Output Gap: A Discussion of Recent Research at the Bank of Canada," Technical Reports 79, Bank of Canada. [Downloadable!]
  6. Alain Guay & Pierre St-Amant, 1997. "Do the Hodrick-Prescott and Baxter-King Filters Provide a Good Approximation of Business Cycles?," Cahiers de recherche CREFE / CREFE Working Papers 53, CREFE, Université du Québec à Montréal. [Downloadable!]
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  1. Karsten Staehr, 2007. "Fiscal policies and business cycles in an enlarged euro area," Bank of Estonia Working Papers 2007-03, Bank of Estonia, revised 08 Mar 2007. [Downloadable!]
  2. Kerstin Bernoth & Andrew Hughes Hallet & John Lewis, 2008. "Did fiscal policy makers know what they were doing? Reassessing fiscal policy with real-time data," DNB Working Papers 169, Netherlands Central Bank, Research Department. [Downloadable!]
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