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Testing the Rationality of State Revenue Forecasts

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  • Daniel R. Feenberg
  • William Gentry
  • David Gilroy
  • Harvey S. Rosen

Abstract

In recent months, the governors of several states have suffered major political embarrassments because actual revenues fell, substantially short of the predictions in their respective budgets. Such episodes focus attention on the question of whether states do a "good" job of forecasting revenues. In modern economics, forecasts are evaluated on the basis of whether or not they are "rational" -- do the forecasts optimally incorporate all information that is available at the tune they are made? This paper develops a method for testing the rationality of state revenue forecasts, and applies it to the analysis of data from New Jersey, Massachusetts, arid Maryland. One of our main findings is that in all three states, the forecasts of own revenues are systematically biased downward.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 2628.

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Date of creation: Nov 1989
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:2628

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  1. Lovell, Michael C, 1986. "Tests of the Rational Expectations Hypothesis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 76(1), pages 110-24, March.
  2. B. Douglas Bernheim, 1989. "The Timing of Retirement: A Comparison of Expectations and Realizations," NBER Chapters, in: The Economics of Aging, pages 335-358 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  3. Brown, Bryan W & Maital, Shlomo, 1981. "What Do Economists Know? An Empirical Study of Experts' Expectations," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(2), pages 491-504, March.
  4. N. Gregory Mankiw & Matthew D. Shapiro, 1986. "News or Noise? An Analysis of GNP Revisions," NBER Working Papers 1939, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  5. John H. Kareken, 1983. "Deposit insurance reform or deregulation is the cart, not the horse," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Spr.
  6. Whitney K. Newey & Kenneth D. West, 1986. "A Simple, Positive Semi-Definite, Heteroskedasticity and AutocorrelationConsistent Covariance Matrix," NBER Technical Working Papers 0055, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  7. Robert B. Litterman & Thomas M. Supel, 1983. "Using vector autoregressions to measure the uncertainty in Minnesota's revenue forecasts," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, issue Spr.
  8. Leonard, Jonathan S, 1982. "Wage Expectations in the Labor Market: Survey Evidence on Rationality," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 64(1), pages 157-61, February.
  9. Zarnowitz, Victor, 1985. "Rational Expectations and Macroeconomic Forecasts," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 3(4), pages 293-311, October.
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Cited by:
  1. Thiess Buettner & Björn Kauder, 2009. "Revenue Forecasting Practices: Differences across Countries and Consequences for Forecasting Performance," CESifo Working Paper Series 2628, CESifo Group Munich.
  2. Wagner, Gary A., 2003. "Are state budget stabilization funds only the illusion of savings?: Evidence from stationary panel data," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 43(2), pages 213-238.
  3. Teresa Leal & Javier J. Pérez & Mika Tujula & Jean-Pierre Vidal, 2008. "Fiscal Forecasting: Lessons from the Literature and Challenges," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 29(3), pages 347-386, 09.
  4. Holtz-Eakin, Douglas & Rosen, Harvey S, 1991. "Municipal Labor Demand in the Presence of Uncertainty: An Econometric Approach," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(3), pages 276-93, July.
  5. Poterba, James M, 1994. "State Responses to Fiscal Crises: The Effects of Budgetary Institutions and Politics," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 102(4), pages 799-821, August.
  6. Ignacio Lago-Peñas & Santiago Lago-Peñas, 2004. "Explaining budgetary indiscipline: evidence from spanish municipalities," ERSA conference papers ersa04p613, European Regional Science Association.
  7. Mocan, H. Naci & Azad, Sam, 1995. "Accuracy and rationality of state General Fund Revenue forecasts: Evidence from panel data," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 11(3), pages 417-427, September.
  8. Leal Linares, Teresa & Pérez García, Javier J., 2011. "Análisis de las desviaciones presupuestarias aplicado al caso del presupuesto del Estado/The Performance of the Budgetary Target of the Central Government in Spain," Estudios de Economía Aplicada, Estudios de Economía Aplicada, vol. 29, pages 909 (14 pá, Diciembre.
  9. Gary Wagner & Russell Sobel, 2006. "State budget stabilization fund adoption: Preparing for the next recession or circumventing fiscal constraints?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 126(1), pages 177-199, January.
  10. Bryan Campbell & Eric Ghysels, 1995. "An Empirical Analysis of the Canadian Budget Process," CIRANO Working Papers 95s-08, CIRANO.
  11. Feenberg, D.R. & Rosen, H.S., 1988. "A Note On Revenue Forecastingduring The Dukakis Administration," Papers 23, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Discussion Paper.
  12. W. Robert Reed & Cynthia L. Rogers, 2005. "Tax Burden and the Mismeasurement of State Tax Policy," Public Economics 0505001, EconWPA.
  13. Naci Mocan, 2007. "Can consumers detect lemons? An empirical analysis of information asymmetry in the market for child care," Journal of Population Economics, Springer, vol. 20(4), pages 743-780, October.

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