IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/25515.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The quest for the best consumer confidence indicator

Author

Listed:
  • Jonsson, Andreas
  • Lindén, Staffan

Abstract

Out of 11 questions included in the EU harmonised consumer questionnaire, it is possible to construct 2 047 different consumer confidence indicators. We search through all these indicators in order to find the single indicator that has the highest correlation with private consumption growth. Moreover, we contrast this indicator to the current Consumer Confidence Indicator used by the European Commission, and some alternative indicators; also in terms of their predictive power of private consumption. The focus of the analysis is thereby on how to best exploit the information content of the current set of questions included in the harmonised consumer questionnaire, while other methodological aspects of the construction of the indicator is left aside. In this context, we test the hypothesis that an indicator based on questions related to the household, rather than the general economy, would prove informative. It seems reasonable to assume that respondents to the surveys have better knowledge of their own economic situation than they have of the general economic situation in their country. We find that this "micro" indicator, as well as an optimal indicator that takes into account the specifics of all EU member states, outperform the current Consumer Confidence Indicator. Both these indicators also perform better than an indicator based on the popular factor methodology.

Suggested Citation

  • Jonsson, Andreas & Lindén, Staffan, 2009. "The quest for the best consumer confidence indicator," MPRA Paper 25515, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:25515
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/25515/1/MPRA_paper_25515.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hall, Robert E, 1978. "Stochastic Implications of the Life Cycle-Permanent Income Hypothesis: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 86(6), pages 971-987, December.
    2. Easaw, Joshy Z. & Garratt, Dean & Heravi, Saeed M., 2005. "Does consumer sentiment accurately forecast UK household consumption? Are there any comparisons to be made with the US?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 27(3), pages 517-532, September.
    3. Carroll, Christopher D & Fuhrer, Jeffrey C & Wilcox, David W, 1994. "Does Consumer Sentiment Forecast Household Spending? If So, Why?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1397-1408, December.
    4. John Y. Campbell & N. Gregory Mankiw, 1989. "Consumption, Income, and Interest Rates: Reinterpreting the Time Series Evidence," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1989, Volume 4, pages 185-246, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. repec:fth:harver:1435 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Saul H. Hymans, 1970. "Consumer Durable Spending: Explanation and Prediction," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 1(2), pages 173-206.
    7. Christian Gayer & Julien Genet, 2006. "Using factor models to construct composite indicators from BCS data - a comparison with European Commission confidence indicators," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 240, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    8. Sydney C. Ludvigson, 2004. "Consumer Confidence and Consumer Spending," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(2), pages 29-50, Spring.
    9. Milton Friedman, 1957. "A Theory of the Consumption Function," NBER Books, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc, number frie57-1, July.
    10. Jeff Dominitz & Charles F. Manski, 2004. "How Should We Measure Consumer Confidence?," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(2), pages 51-66, Spring.
    11. G. Goldrian & J.D. Lindbauer & G. Nerb & B. Ulrich, 2001. "Evaluation and development of confidence indicators based on harmonised business and consumer surveys (Study contracted to IFO, Munich)," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 151, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    12. Jason Bram & Sydney C. Ludvigson, 1998. "Does consumer confidence forecast household expenditure? a sentiment index horse race," Economic Policy Review, Federal Reserve Bank of New York, vol. 4(Jun), pages 59-78.
    13. E. Philip Howrey, 2001. "The Predictive Power of the Index of Consumer Sentiment," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 32(1), pages 175-216.
    14. Olivier Jean Blanchard & Stanley Fischer, 1989. "Lectures on Macroeconomics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262022834, December.
    15. Christian Gayer, 2007. "A fresh look at business cycle synchronisation in the euro area," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 287, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    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. I. De Greef & C. Van Nieuwenhuyze, 2009. "The National Bank of Belgium, Research Department’s new business survey indicator," Economic Review, National Bank of Belgium, issue ii, pages 31-51, June.
    2. Christian Gayer & Alessandro Girardi & Andreas Reuter, 2016. "Replacing Judgment by Statistics: Constructing Consumer Confidence Indicators on the basis of Data-driven Techniques. The Case of the Euro Area," Working Papers LuissLab 16125, Dipartimento di Economia e Finanza, LUISS Guido Carli.
    3. Roland Döhrn & Tobias Kitlinski & Martin Micheli & Torsten Schmidt & Simeon Vosen & György Barabas & Heinz Gebhardt & Lina Zimmermann, 2010. "Die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung im Inland zur Jahresmitte 2010 - Aufschwung verliert an Fahrt," RWI Konjunkturbericht, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, pages 46, 09.
    4. Döhrn, Roland & Barabas, György & Gebhardt, Heinz & Kitlinski, Tobias & Micheli, Martin & Schmidt, Torsten & Vosen, Simeon & Zimmermann, Lina, 2010. "Die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung im Inland: Aufschwung verliert an Fahrt," RWI Konjunkturberichte, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, vol. 61(2), pages 37-82.
    5. Aneta M. Klopocka & Rumiana Gorska, 2021. "Forecasting Household Saving Rate with Consumer Confidence Indicator and its Components: Panel Data Analysis of 14 European Countries," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3), pages 874-898.
    6. Ivana Lolić & Marija Logarušić & Mirjana Čižmešija, 2022. "Recent Revision of the European Consumer Confidence Indicator: Is There any additional Space for Improvement?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 159(3), pages 845-863, February.
    7. Christian Dreger & Konstantin Arkadievich Kholodilin, 2013. "Forecasting Private Consumption by Consumer Surveys," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(1), pages 10-18, January.

    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. Andreas Jonsson & Staffan Lindén, 2009. "The quest for the best consumer confidence indicator," European Economy - Economic Papers 2008 - 2015 372, Directorate General Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
    2. Claes Fornell & Paul Damien & Marcin Kacperczyk & Michel Wedel, 2018. "Does Aggregate Buyer Satisfaction affect Household Consumption Growth?," DOCFRADIS Working Papers 1802, Catedra Fundación Ramón Areces de Distribución Comercial, revised Jun 2018.
    3. Sudeshna Ghosh, 2021. "Consumer Confidence and Consumer Spending in Brazil: A Nonlinear Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model Analysis," Arthaniti: Journal of Economic Theory and Practice, , vol. 20(1), pages 53-85, June.
    4. Christian Dreger & Konstantin Arkadievich Kholodilin, 2013. "Forecasting Private Consumption by Consumer Surveys," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(1), pages 10-18, January.
    5. Brigitte Desroches & Marc-André Gosselin, 2002. "The Usefulness of Consumer Confidence Indexes in the United States," Staff Working Papers 02-22, Bank of Canada.
    6. Eleni Zafeiriou & Constantinos Katrakilidis & Chrysanthi Pegiou, 2019. "Consumer Confidence on Heating Oil Prices: An Empirical Study of their Relationship for European Union in a Nonlinear Framework," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(1), pages 63-90.
    7. Stephen Bruestle & W. Mark Crain, 2015. "A mean-variance approach to forecasting with the consumer confidence index," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(23), pages 2430-2444, May.
    8. Lucia F. Dunn & Ida A. Mirzaie, 2006. "Turns in Consumer Confidence: An Information Advantage Linked to Manufacturing," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 44(2), pages 343-351, April.
    9. Aneta Maria Kłopocka, 2017. "Does Consumer Confidence Forecast Household Saving and Borrowing Behavior? Evidence for Poland," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 133(2), pages 693-717, September.
    10. Brigitte Desroches & Marc‐André Gosselin, 2004. "Evaluating Threshold Effects in Consumer Sentiment," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 70(4), pages 942-952, April.
    11. Bengt Assarsson & Pär Österholm, 2015. "Do Swedish Consumer Confidence Indicators Do What They Are Intended to Do?," Applied Economics Quarterly (formerly: Konjunkturpolitik), Duncker & Humblot GmbH, Berlin, vol. 61(4), pages 391-404.
    12. Robert B. Barsky & Eric R. Sims, 2012. "Information, Animal Spirits, and the Meaning of Innovations in Consumer Confidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1343-1377, June.
    13. Konstantinou, Panagiotis & Tagkalakis, Athanasios, 2011. "Boosting confidence: Is there a role for fiscal policy?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 28(4), pages 1629-1641, July.
    14. S. Heravi & J. Easaw & R. Golinelli, 2016. "Generalized State-Dependent Models: A Multivariate Approach," Working Papers wp1067, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    15. Hassan Gholipour Fereidouni & Reza Tajaddini, 2017. "Housing Wealth, Financial Wealth and Consumption Expenditure: The Role of Consumer Confidence," The Journal of Real Estate Finance and Economics, Springer, vol. 54(2), pages 216-236, February.
    16. André Filipe Guedes Almeida & Gabriel Caldas Montes, 2020. "Effects of crime and violence on business confidence: evidence from Rio de Janeiro," Journal of Economic Studies, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 47(7), pages 1669-1688, May.
    17. Baghestani, Hamid, 2021. "Predicting growth in US durables spending using consumer durables-buying attitudes," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 327-336.
    18. Juhro, Solikin M. & Iyke, Bernard Njindan, 2020. "Consumer confidence and consumption expenditure in Indonesia," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 367-377.
    19. Aneta M. Klopocka & Rumiana Gorska, 2021. "Forecasting Household Saving Rate with Consumer Confidence Indicator and its Components: Panel Data Analysis of 14 European Countries," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3), pages 874-898.
    20. Hector H. Sandoval & Anita N. Walsh, 2021. "The role of consumer confidence in forecasting consumption, evidence from Florida," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 88(2), pages 757-788, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Consumer confidence; private consumption; predictive power;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • E27 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • E29 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Other
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth

    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:pra:mprapa:25515. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.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.