In the period before the second World War, the Dutch Bureau of Statistics had developed two sets of indicators ofunemployment in the Netherlands. One was based on statistical data of unemployment insurance funds of tradeunions and the other one on statistical data of labour exchanges. This paper...

We provide a new definition of breakdown in finite samples with an extension to asymptotic breakdown. Previous definitions center around defining a critical region for either the parameter or the objective function. If for a particular outlier constellation the critical region is entered,...

Estimation of the volatility of time series has taken off since the introduction of the GARCH and stochastic volatility models. While variants of the GARCH model are applied in scores of articles, use of the stochastic volatility model is less widespread. In this article it is argued that one...

The inequality dataset compiled in the 1990s by the World Bank and extendedby the UN has been both widely used and strongly criticized. The criticisms raisequestions about conclusions drawn from secondary inequality datasets in general. Wedevelop techniques to deal with national and...

We propose an observation-driven dynamic common factor model for missing value imputation in high-dimensional panel data. The model exploits both serial and cross-sectional information in the data and can easily cope with time-variation in conditional means and variances, as well as with either...

Convergence in gross domestic product series of five European countriesis empirically identified using multivariate time series models that arebased on unobserved components with dynamic converging properties.We define convergence in terms of a decrease in dispersion over timeand model this...

This paper investigates business cycle relations among different economies in theEuro area. Cyclical dynamics are explicitly modelled as part of a time series model. Weintroduce mechanisms that allow for increasing or diminishing phase shifts and for time-varyingassociation patterns in different...

This paper proposes a new model-based method to obtain a coincident indicator for the business cycle. A dynamic factor model with trend components and a common cycle component is considered which can be estimated using standard maximum likelihood methods. The multivariate unobserved components...