The Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) is the single most important indicator of inflation used by the European Central Bank. Sections 2 to 4 of the paper look at the theory of inflation indexes that could be used as target indexes of inflation. A Consumer Price Index (CPI) emerges as...

This paper studies the problems of measuring economic growth under conditions of high inflation. Traditional bilateral index number theory implicitly assumes that variations in the price of a commodity within a period can be ignored. In order to justify this assumption under conditions of high...

This working paper is the first draft of an overview and commentary on the papers to appear in a Macroeconomic Dynamics Special Issue on Measurement with Theory. The included papers in the special issue are part of a larger initiative to promote "measurement with theory" in economics and planned...

The goal of this paper is to theoretically and empirically demonstrate the consequences of different imputation methods, using recent data from the International Price Program. We suppose that prices are missing due to random or erratic reporting. We consider three different imputation methods:...

The paper considers how to measure capital in a model where technical progress is either embodied in new units of capital or it is "disembodied" and simply causes the price of capital services to fall. The disembodied case is considered in sections 2-4. Sections 2 and 3 set out standard vintage...

It is common for comparisons to be made of output growth and inflation across groups of countries, yet such comparisons can result in inconsistencies. We address two problems: (i) how to measure aggregate real output and inflation for groups of countries and (ii) how to construct measures of...

The paper presents a decomposition of a production unit’s cost ratio over two periods into explanatory factors. The explanatory factors are growth in the unit’s cost efficiency, output growth, changes in input prices and technical progress. In order to implement the decomposition, an...

The paper studies the problems associated with the construction of price indexes for commercial properties that could be used in the System of National Accounts. Property price indexes are required for the stocks of commercial properties in the Balance Sheets of the country. Related service...

This paper develops a new framework for measuring prices and quantities of commercial properties. In particular, it addresses problems associated with obtaining separate estimates for the land and structure components of a property. A key contribution is to address the problem of estimating...

Caves, Christensen, Diewert introduced Malmquist output, input and productivity indexes into production theory in a systematic way. This paper revisits the debate on how to decompose Bjurek’s concept of a Malmquist productivity index into explanatory factors, with a focus on extracting...