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Evaluating the forecast quality of GDP components: An application to G7

Author

Listed:
  • Paulo Júlio

    (Office for Strategy and Studies, Portuguese Ministry of Economy and Employment)

  • Pedro M. Esperança

Abstract

We evaluate the quality of OECD's and IMF's forecasts for real GDP growth and for GDP expenditure components. We use a scaled statistic to compare the prediction models' performance across GDP components with different volatilities and decompose the GDP forecast error into the corresponding component contributions. Moreover, we use two recently proposed statistics - Mean of Total Weighted Absolute Error and Mean of Total Weighted Squared Error - to evaluate the overall accuracy of component predictions. We conclude that overpredictions in investment and net exports explain GDP overpredictions at 1-year horizons. Accurate GDP forecasts for same-year predictions are mostly explained by canceling out effects in component prediction errors - mainly in exports and imports - rather than by accurate component predictions. We also show that forecasts are in general inefficient for both GDP and its components and that the 2008 crisis had a large negative effect on the quality of forecasts being issued, but not on the predictive quality of forecast models.

Suggested Citation

  • Paulo Júlio & Pedro M. Esperança, 2012. "Evaluating the forecast quality of GDP components: An application to G7," GEE Papers 0047, Gabinete de Estratégia e Estudos, Ministério da Economia, revised Apr 2012.
    • Handle: RePEc:mde:wpaper:0047
    as

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    References listed on IDEAS

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    2. Martin Feldkircher & Nico Hauzenberger, 2019. "How useful are time-varying parameter models for forecasting economic growth in CESEE?," Focus on European Economic Integration, Oesterreichische Nationalbank (Austrian Central Bank), issue Q1/19, pages 29-48.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Forecast evaluation; GDP expenditure components; Mean of total weighted absolute error; Mean of total weighted squared error; G7; 2008 crisis;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • 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
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

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