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The Michigan Surveys of Consumers and consumer spending

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  • Michelle L. Barnes
  • Giovanni P. Olivei

Abstract

We provide summary measures for a broad set of questions from the Michigan Surveys of Consumers. These measures summarize consumers' attitudes and expectations with respect to income, wealth, prices, and interest rates. They contain information that goes beyond the information captured by the Michigan Index of Consumer Sentiment, which is constructed from five questions in the same survey. We show that the summary measures have some explanatory power for aggregate consumption behavior over the period from 1987 to the present, even when controlling for economic fundamentals. The explanatory power is statistically significant, but, although greater than the explanatory power of consumer sentiment, still relatively modest from an economic standpoint. We discuss the information in these summary measures, which may be useful in forecasting consumption behavior at the current juncture, as some of the signals from the survey are not entirely reflected in standard economic fundamentals.

Suggested Citation

  • Michelle L. Barnes & Giovanni P. Olivei, 2013. "The Michigan Surveys of Consumers and consumer spending," Public Policy Brief, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedbpb:00006
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. 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.
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    3. Mr. Christopher Carroll & Mr. Martin Sommer & Mr. Jiri Slacalek, 2012. "Dissecting Saving Dynamics: Measuring Wealth, Precautionary, and Credit Effects," IMF Working Papers 2012/219, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Hamilton, James D., 2003. "What is an oil shock?," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 113(2), pages 363-398, April.
    5. Sydney C. Ludvigson, 2004. "Consumer Confidence and Consumer Spending," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 18(2), pages 29-50, Spring.
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    Cited by:

    1. Michelle L. Barnes & Giovanni P. Olivei, 2014. "The forecasting power of consumer attitudes for consumer spending," Working Papers 14-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    2. 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.

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E27 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • E52 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit - - - Monetary Policy
    • E21 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Consumption; Saving; Wealth
    • E66 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomic Policy, Macroeconomic Aspects of Public Finance, and General Outlook - - - General Outlook and Conditions

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