This paper considers the problem of aggregation in the case of large linear dynamic panels, where each micro unit is potentially related to all other micro units, and where micro innovations are allowed to be cross sectionally dependent. Following Pesaran (2003), an optimal aggregate function is...

This study addresses two significant limitations in the literature on cross-country expenditure comparisons: (a) treatment of all countries, large and small, as single entities with no spatial differences inside the countries, and (b) use of Divisia price indices, rather than preference based...

The inflation rate is normally computed as a weighted average of individual price changes. Alternatively, this rate could be evaluated by comparing average price levels. Unfortunately, this methodology has received limited attention in past research. This study attempts to remedy this situation...

In order to provide information concerning the significant contributions to price index theory made by Moritz Wilhelm Drobisch (1802-1896), this paper presents an account of his pioneering scientific achievements together with a synopsis of his personal and professional life. He was the first to...

Textbooks of macroeconomics regularly remind their readers that they should not interpret the macroeconomic price variable as some sort of average price. Instead it represents some price index indicating the average of the individual items' price changes between the period considered and some...

Disequilibrium in the housing market can be detected by comparing the actual price-rent ratio with its equilibrium counterpart obtained from the user-cost condition. Empirical implementation of this idea, however, is problematic because of quality differences between sold and rented dwellings....

The increasing availability of geospatial data (i.e., exact longitudes and latitudes for each house) has the potential to improve the quality of house price indexes. It is not clear though how best to use this information. We show how geospatial data can be included as a nonparametric spline...

This paper is a theoretical review of consumer price indices, with an emphasis on the specifics of the real estate market, highlighting advantages and limitations. It discusses the following indices of average prices: Laspeyres, Paasche, Fisher and Jevons. In addition, it presents two variations...

Monetary policymakers and long-term investors would benefit greatly from a measure of underlying inflation that uses all relevant information, is available in real time, and forecasts inflation better than traditional underlying inflation measures such as core inflation measures. This paper...

This paper computes and compares alternative quality-adjusted price indexes for new cars in Spain in the period 1990 - 2000. The proposed hedonic approach simultaneously controls for time-invariant unobserved product effects and age effects, that can be interpreted as a proxy for time-variant...