This paper compares two alternative measures of technology differences across industrial countries during 1970-92: one measures differences in labor productivity (the Ricardian measure), and the other differences in total factor productivity (the Hicksian measure). The distinction between the...

Over the past two decades, U.S. core PCE goods and services inflation have evolved differently. Against the backdrop of global concerns of low inflation, we use this trend as motivation to develop a bottom-up model of U.S. inflation. We find that domestic forces play a larger role relative to...

We describe the evolution of forecasts in the run-up to recessions. The GDP forecasts cover 63 countries for the years 1992 to 2014. The main finding is that, while forecasters are generally aware that recession years will be different from other years, they miss the magnitude of the recession...

We compared the predictive performance of a series of machine learning and traditional methods for monthly CDS spreads, using firms' accounting-based, market-based and macroeconomics variables for a time period of 2006 to 2016. We find that ensemble machine learning methods (Bagging, Gradient...

I regress real GDP growth rates on the IMF's growth forecasts and find that IMF forecasts behave similarly to those generated by overfitted models, placing too much weight on observable predictors and underestimating the forces of mean reversion. I identify several such variables that explain...

The political economy literature has put forward a multitude of hypotheses regarding the drivers of structural reforms, but few, if any, empirically robust findings have emerged thus far. To make progress, we draw a parallel with model uncertainty in the growth literature and provide a new...

This paper outlines the key features of the production version of the quarterly projection model (QPM), which is a forward-looking open-economy gap model, calibrated to represent the Indian case, for generating forecasts and risk assessment as well as conducting policy analysis. QPM incorporates...

Macroeconomic analysis in Lebanon presents a distinct challenge. For example, long delays in the publication of GDP data mean that our analysis often relies on proxy variables, and resembles an extended version of the 'nowcasting' challenge familiar to many central banks. Addressing this...