IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hep/macppr/200602.html

Forecast errors and the macroeconomy — a non-linear relationship?

Author

Listed:
  • Ulrich Fritsche

    (Department for Economics and Politics, University of Hamburg, and DIW Berlin)

  • Joerg Doepke

    (Fachhochschule Merseburg)

Abstract

The paper analyses reasons for departures from strong rationality of growth and inflation forecasts based on annual observations from 1963 to 2004. We rely on forecasts from the joint forecast of the so-called "six leading" forecasting institutions in Germany and argue that violations of the rationality hypothesis are due to relatively few large forecast errors. These large errors are shown - based on evidence from probit models - to correlate with macroeconomic fundamentals, especially on monetary factors. We test for a non-linear relation between forecast errors and macroeconomic fundamentals and find evidence for such a non-linearity for inflation forecasts.

Suggested Citation

  • Ulrich Fritsche & Joerg Doepke, 2006. "Forecast errors and the macroeconomy — a non-linear relationship?," Macroeconomics and Finance Series 200602, University of Hamburg, Department of Socioeconomics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hep:macppr:200602
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wiso.uni-hamburg.de/repec/hepdoc/macppr_2_2006.pdf
    File Function: First version, 2006
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Christina D. Romer & David H. Romer, 2004. "A New Measure of Monetary Shocks: Derivation and Implications," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(4), pages 1055-1084, September.
    2. Pierre St-Amant, 1996. "Decomposing U.S. Nominal Interest Rates into Expected Inflation and Ex Ante Real Interest rates Using Structural VAR Methodology," Staff Working Papers 96-2, Bank of Canada.
    3. Holden, K & Peel, D A, 1990. "On Testing for Unbiasedness and Efficiency of Forecasts," The Manchester School of Economic & Social Studies, University of Manchester, vol. 58(2), pages 120-127, June.
    4. N. Gregory Mankiw & Ricardo Reis & Justin Wolfers, 2004. "Disagreement about Inflation Expectations," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 2003, Volume 18, pages 209-270, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Gebhardt Kirschgässner & Marcel Savioz, 2001. "Monetary Policy and Forecasts for Real GDP Growth: An Empirical Investigation for the Federal Republic of Germany," German Economic Review, Verein für Socialpolitik, vol. 2(4), pages 339-365, November.
    6. Christina D. Romer & David H. Romer, 1989. "Does Monetary Policy Matter? A New Test in the Spirit of Friedman and Schwartz," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1989, Volume 4, pages 121-184, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. David Laster & Paul Bennett & In Sun Geoum, 1999. "Rational Bias in Macroeconomic Forecasts," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 293-318.
    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. is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Heinisch, Katja & Scaramella, Fabio & Schult, Christoph, 2025. "Assumption errors and forecast accuracy: A partial linear instrumental variable and double machine learning approach," IWH Discussion Papers 6/2025, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    3. Luis Pacheco, 2010. "ECB Projections: should leave it to the pros?," Working Papers 11/2010, Universidade Portucalense, Centro de Investigação em Gestão e Economia (CIGE).
    4. Birger Antholz, 2006. "Geschichte der quantitativen Konjunkturprognose-Evaluation in Deutschland," Vierteljahrshefte zur Wirtschaftsforschung / Quarterly Journal of Economic Research, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 75(2), pages 12-33.

    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. Xavier Gabaix, 2017. "Behavioral Inattention," NBER Working Papers 24096, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Oleksiy Kryvtsov, 2005. "Information Flows and Aggregate Persistence," Computing in Economics and Finance 2005 416, Society for Computational Economics.
    3. Breuer Christian, 2015. "On the Rationality of Medium-Term Tax Revenue Forecasts: Evidence from Germany," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 235(1), pages 22-40, February.
    4. Carlo Rosa & Giovanni Verga, 2006. "The Impact of Central Bank Announcements on Asset Prices in Real Time: Testing the Efficiency of the Euribor Futures Market," CEP Discussion Papers dp0764, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    5. Rosa, Carlo, 2013. "Market efficiency broadcasted live: ECB code words and euro exchange rates," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 38(PB), pages 167-178.
    6. Hüseyin ŞEN & Ayşe KAYA, 2017. "Mali Konsolidasyon Büyüme ve İstihdam için Bir Çıpa mı, Mali Tuzak mı? Teorik ve Ampirik Literatür Temelli Bir Analiz," Sosyoekonomi Journal, Sosyoekonomi Society, issue 25(34).
    7. Sung-Eun Yu, 2017. "The Role of Nonbank Financial Institutions in the Monetary Transmission Mechanism: Theory and Evidence," Working Paper Series, Department of Economics, University of Utah 2017_04, University of Utah, Department of Economics.
    8. Pat McAllister & Graeme Newell & George Matysiak, 2005. "An Evaluation Of The Performance Of UK Real Estate Forecasters," Real Estate & Planning Working Papers rep-wp2005-23, Henley Business School, University of Reading.
    9. Mauricio Villamizar, 2014. "Identifying the Effects of Simultaneous Monetary Policy Shocks. Fear of Floating under Inflation targeting," Borradores de Economia 835, Banco de la Republica de Colombia.
    10. Mr. Jinzhu Chen & Mr. Bharat Trehan & Mr. Prakash Kannan & Mr. Prakash Loungani, 2011. "New Evidenceon Cyclical and Structural Sources of Unemployment," IMF Working Papers 2011/106, International Monetary Fund.
    11. Gabriele Ciminelli & Romain Duval & Davide Furceri, 2022. "Employment Protection Deregulation and Labor Shares in Advanced Economies," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(6), pages 1174-1190, November.
    12. Goy, Gavin & Hommes, Cars & Mavromatis, Kostas, 2022. "Forward guidance and the role of central bank credibility under heterogeneous beliefs," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 200(C), pages 1240-1274.
    13. Dovern, Jonas & Jannsen, Nils, 2017. "Systematic errors in growth expectations over the business cycle," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 760-769.
    14. Rianne Legerstee & Philip Hans Franses, 2015. "Does Disagreement Amongst Forecasters Have Predictive Value?," Journal of Forecasting, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 34(4), pages 290-302, July.
    15. Rubén Fernández-Fuertes, 2025. "Monetary Policy Shocks: A New Hope. Large Language Models and Central Bank Communication," BAFFI CAREFIN Working Papers 25257, BAFFI CAREFIN, Centre for Applied Research on International Markets Banking Finance and Regulation, Universita' Bocconi, Milano, Italy.
    16. McNeil, James, 2023. "Monetary policy and the term structure of inflation expectations with information frictions," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    17. Mr. Christopher W. Crowe & Mr. S. Mahdi Barakchian, 2010. "Monetary Policy Matters: New Evidence Basedon a New Shock Measure," IMF Working Papers 2010/230, International Monetary Fund.
    18. Kerry Loaiza-Marín & Jose Pablo Barquero-Romero, 2025. "Monetary Policy and the Credit Channel, 2008-2019," Documentos de Trabajo 2504, Banco Central de Costa Rica.
    19. Dimitris Mokas & Massimo Giuliodori, 2021. "Effects of LTV announcements in EU economies," Working Papers 704, DNB.
    20. Eric Monnet, 2014. "Monetary Policy without Interest Rates: Evidence from France's Golden Age (1948 to 1973) Using a Narrative Approach," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 137-169, October.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications
    • C52 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Model Evaluation, Validation, and Selection
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:hep:macppr:200602. 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: Ulrich Fritsche The email address of this maintainer does not seem to be valid anymore. Please ask Ulrich Fritsche to update the entry or send us the correct address (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/dwuhhde.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.