Inflation is currently low and falling in the OECD area. A side effect of these facts is that they made harder the task of price index compilers. First of all, researchers and analysts are moving their attention from aggregate price dynamics to price differentials (among products, markets,...

Quality adjustment of price indexes affects the analysis of many sensitive economic issues, such as real growth, productivity, international competitiveness, real wages, per-capita consumption and poverty, other than inflation. Hedonic methods are often recommended and increasingly used in the...

Estimation of spatial housing price indices requires a housing market segmentation into local sub-markets. In this paper, we use geographically weighted regression model (GWR) to take account for spatial heterogeneity of housing attribute marginal prices. Estimated marginal prices are then used...

This paper proposes a methodology for a spatial cost index of housing that considers spatial heterogeneity in properties across regions. The index is built by combining three different techniques to reduce the spatial heterogeneity in housing: Quasi-experimental methods, hedonic prices and...

Housing co-operatives, also known as “tenant-owner co-operative housing”, provide an alternative to both renting and owning a dwelling. As an indirect form of ownership, it poses some conceptual and practical issues to anyone aiming at compiling a price index covering all forms of...

Ladislaus von Bortkiewicz has criticized chain indices and Irving Fisher's time and factor reversal tests. However, his arguments (published in German articles) though well ahead of his time and still relevant today are widely fallen in oblivion. He was not the only German statistician who...

Stochastic approach to index number (and its change) has recently attracted renewed attention of researchers as it provides the standard error of index number (and its change). One of the most important uses of index number is in the case of measurement of the general price level in an economy...

Economists have been noting for decades that Consumer Price Index (CPI) in the developed countries is overstating inflation by 0,5−2,0% per year. A significant part of the bias is due to the presence of technology products and differentiated products in the CPI basket. An increase share of...

Given the highly kurtotic and positively skewed characteristics of cross-sectional distribution of price, asymmetric trimmed-mean is the best approach in extracting the statistical medium-term trend of inflation. This paper uses asymmetric trimmed-mean approach to measure core inflation in...

This paper explores the extent to which goods follow systematic pricing patterns over their life cycle. The theoretical literature, and anecdotal evidence, often suggests that new products are often introduced at high prices which decline as the good ages while, older goods exit the market at a...