Using a quarterly consumer expectations survey, we propose two novel measures of the optimism bias in consumers, ex ante optimism and ex post optimism. We demonstrate empirically that excessive optimism about future family finances impacts the real economy. Ex ante , excessive optimism compels...

Using a quarterly consumer expectations survey, we propose two novel measures of consumer optimism, ex ante optimism and ex post optimism. We demonstrate empirically that excessive optimism about future family finances impacts the real economy. The excessive optimism (ex ante optimism) compels...

This paper extracts measures of monetary policy surprises for Australia, Canada and the United States using a latent factor framework. We distinguish monetary policy surprises which occur when central banks report new assessments of the economy (or do not reinforce changes expected by market...