IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v85y2003i3p605-617.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Real-Time Data Set for Macroeconomists: Does the Data Vintage Matter?

Author

Listed:
  • Dean Croushore

    (Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia)

  • Tom Stark

    (Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia)

Abstract

This paper uses a real-time data set to analyze data revisions and to test the robustness of published econometric results. The data set consists of vintages, or snapshots, of the major macroeconomic data available at quarterly intervals in real time. The paper illustrates why such data may matter, examines the properties of several of the variables in the data set across vintages, and examines key empirical papers in macroeconomics, investigating their robustness to different vintages. © 2003 President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Suggested Citation

  • Dean Croushore & Tom Stark, 2003. "A Real-Time Data Set for Macroeconomists: Does the Data Vintage Matter?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 85(3), pages 605-617, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:85:y:2003:i:3:p:605-617
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/003465303322369759
    File Function: link to full text
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. 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.
    2. Maravall, Agustin & Pierce, David A, 1986. "The Transmission of Data Noise into Policy Noise in U.S. Monetary Control," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 54(4), pages 961-979, July.
    3. 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.
    4. David E. Runkle, 1998. "Revisionist history: how data revisions distort economic policy research," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 22(Fall), pages 3-12.
    5. Glenn D. Rudebusch, 2001. "Is The Fed Too Timid? Monetary Policy In An Uncertain World," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 83(2), pages 203-217, May.
    6. Eric Ghysels & Norman R. Swanson & Myles Callan, 2002. "Monetary Policy Rules with Model and Data Uncertainty," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 69(2), pages 239-265, October.
    7. Orphanides, Athanasios, 2003. "Monetary policy evaluation with noisy information," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(3), pages 605-631, April.
    8. John H. Cochrane, 1994. "Permanent and Transitory Components of GNP and Stock Prices," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Oxford University Press, vol. 109(1), pages 241-265.
    9. Beveridge, Stephen & Nelson, Charles R., 1981. "A new approach to decomposition of economic time series into permanent and transitory components with particular attention to measurement of the `business cycle'," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 7(2), pages 151-174.
    10. 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.
    11. Rudebusch, Glenn D, 1998. "Do Measures of Monetary Policy in a VAR Make Sense?," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 39(4), pages 907-931, November.
    12. Finn E. Kydland & Edward C. Prescott, 1990. "Business cycles: real facts and a monetary myth," Quarterly Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, vol. 14(Spr), pages 3-18.
    13. Dean Croushore & Tom Stark, 1999. "Does data vintage matter for forecasting?," Working Papers 99-15, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    14. Flavin, Marjorie A, 1981. "The Adjustment of Consumption to Changing Expectations about Future Income," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 89(5), pages 974-1009, October.
    15. Francis X. Diebold & Glenn D. Rudebusch, 1989. "Forecasting output with the composite leading index: an ex ante analysis," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 90, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    16. Jeffery D. Amato, 1998. "The real-time (in)significance of M2," Research Working Paper 98-05, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
    17. Charles L. Evans, 1998. "Real-time Taylor rules and the federal funds futures market," Economic Perspectives, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, vol. 22(Q III), pages 44-55.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Croushore, Dean & Stark, Tom, 2001. "A real-time data set for macroeconomists," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 105(1), pages 111-130, November.
    2. Dean Croushore & Tom Stark, 2002. "Is macroeconomic research robust to alternative data sets?," Working Papers 02-3, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    3. Dean Croushore & Tom Stark, 2000. "A real-time data set for macroeconomists: does data vintage matter for forecasting?," Working Papers 00-6, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia.
    4. Croushore, Dean & Evans, Charles L., 2006. "Data revisions and the identification of monetary policy shocks," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(6), pages 1135-1160, September.
    5. Dean Croushore, 2011. "Frontiers of Real-Time Data Analysis," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 49(1), pages 72-100, March.
    6. Issler, Joao Victor & Vahid, Farshid, 2001. "Common cycles and the importance of transitory shocks to macroeconomic aggregates," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 449-475, June.
    7. Velimir Šonje & Igeta Vrbanc, 2000. "Measuring the Similarities of Economic Developments in Central Europe: A Correlation between the Business Cycles of Germany, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Croatia," Working Papers 3, The Croatian National Bank, Croatia.
    8. Issler, João Victor & Rodrigues, Claudia & Burjack, Rafael, 2014. "Using common features to understand the behavior of metal-commodity prices and forecast them at different horizons," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 310-335.
    9. Christiano, Lawrence J. & Eichenbaum, Martin, 1990. "Unit roots in real GNP: Do we know, and do we care?," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 7-61, January.
    10. Zsolt Darvas & Gábor Vadas, 2003. "Univariate Potential Output Estimations for Hungary," MNB Working Papers 2003/8, Magyar Nemzeti Bank (Central Bank of Hungary).
    11. Antonio Fatás & Sanjay R. Singh, 2022. "Supply or Demand? Policy Makers' Confusion in the Presence of Hysteresis," Working Papers 347, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    12. Hilde Bjørnland & Leif Brubakk & Anne Jore, 2008. "Forecasting inflation with an uncertain output gap," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 413-436, November.
    13. Jean-Philippe Cayen & Simon van Norden, 2002. "La fiabilité des estimations de l'écart de production au Canada," Staff Working Papers 02-10, Bank of Canada.
    14. Clements, Michael P. & Beatriz Galvão, Ana, 2010. "First announcements and real economic activity," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(6), pages 803-817, August.
    15. Gradzewicz, Michal & Kolasa, Marcin, 2004. "Estimating the output gap in the Polish economy: the VECM approach," MPRA Paper 28227, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. Guillen, Osmani Teixeira Carvalho & Issler, João Victor & Franco Neto, Afonso Arinos de Mello, 2012. "On the welfare costs of business-cycle fluctuations and economic-growth variation in the 20th century," FGV EPGE Economics Working Papers (Ensaios Economicos da EPGE) 734, EPGE Brazilian School of Economics and Finance - FGV EPGE (Brazil).
    17. Andrew C. Chang & Phillip Li, 2018. "Measurement Error In Macroeconomic Data And Economics Research: Data Revisions, Gross Domestic Product, And Gross Domestic Income," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 56(3), pages 1846-1869, July.
    18. Narayan, Paresh Kumar & Narayan, Seema & Smyth, Russell, 2011. "Energy consumption at business cycle horizons: The case of the United States," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 161-167, March.
    19. Christoffersen, Peter & Ghysels, Eric & Swanson, Norman R., 2002. "Let's get "real" about using economic data," Journal of Empirical Finance, Elsevier, vol. 9(3), pages 343-360, August.
    20. M.S.Rafiq, 2006. "Business Cycle Moderation - Good Policies or Good Luck: Evidence and Explanations for the Euro Area," Discussion Paper Series 2006_21, Department of Economics, Loughborough University.

    More about this item

    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:tpr:restat:v:85:y:2003:i:3:p:605-617. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: . General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    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: Kelly McDougall (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    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.