Could a researcher or policy analyst use data reported from surveys of consumer confidence to improve forecasts of consumer spending? This issue has been examined in the literature previously, which reached the conclusion that consumer confidence helped improve the forecasts slightly. But that...

In this paper, we use the Wall Street Journal poll of FX forecasts to analyze how the group of forecasters form their expectations. One focus is whether forecasters build rational expectations. Furthermore, we analyze whether the group of forecasters can be regarded as homogeneous or...

This paper studies the signalling effect of the consumption-wealth ratio (cay) on German stock returns via vector error correction models (VECMs). The effect of cay on U.S. stock returns has been recently confirmed by Lettau and Ludvigson with a two-stage method. In this paper, performances of...

The 1990s were the most prosperous decade in U.S. economic history. The paper analyses to which extent this period fits into preceding cyclical experience. This is done by classifying the period 1991-12 to 2000-12 with the help of a 4-phase classification scheme based on multivariate...

Trust or likewise "confidence" (the term preferred in this paper) are notions which have received considerable attention by economists in the last 8-10 years. In this contribution, much emphasis is put on the understanding what we really mean by "confidence", what the differences between...

It is obvious that the German economy exhibits a significant decline in economic growth during the last two decades. Although the German economy has still to overcome the burden of the reunification in 1990 it is shown that this burden might be only one reason of this decline. In this study we...

Various inflation forecasting models are compared using a simulated out-of-sample forecasting framework. We focus on the question of whether monetary aggregates are useful for forecasting inflation, but unlike previous work we examine a wide range of forecast horizons and allow for estimated as...

Die Regierung Bush hält sich zugute, seit ihrem Amtsantritt Anfang 2001 eine schwierige wirtschaftliche Lage durch aktive Wirtschaftspolitik erfolgreich überwunden zu haben. Deutliche Steuersenkungen und die Inkaufnahme eines massiven Defizits des Bundeshaushalts - bei stark steigenden...

In den sechziger Jahren lag das reale Wachstum in Europa noch über dem der USA. Danach sanken in beiden Teilen der Welt tendenziell die Wachstumsraten. Anfang der Achtziger Jahre folgte allerdings in den USA eine Phase hohen Wirtschaftswachstums, so dass die Wachstumsraten und die...

In den USA wird seit 1996 die Wachstumsrate des realen BIP auf der Basis eines "chain-type annual-weighted" Fisher-Index ermittelt, d.h. die Wachstumsrate des realen BIP ist zwar unabhängig vom Basisjahr, andererseits ist aber nicht mehr gewährleistet, dass das BIP gleich der Summe seiner...