The composite index of leading indicators is found to be a valuable tool for predicting not only the direction but also … index as a predictor of (1) business cycle turning points as dated by the National Bureau of Economic Research and (2 …) quantitative changes in real GNP and the composite index of coincident indicators. Specific smoothing rules are identified which …

The index of leading economic indicators first developed by the NBER remains a popular informal forecasting tool in … spite of the original criticism that its use represents "measurement without theory. " This paper seeks to evaluate the … performance of the index in comparison to alternative time series methods in predicting business cycle behavior. While the actual …

The standard source for pre-WWII global freight rate trends is the Isserlis British tramp shipping index. We think it … the precipitous decline in nominal freight rates before the World War I, but it also extends the series to the 1940s …. Furthermore, our new series is linked to the post-World War II era (documented by David Hummels), so that we can be more precise …

Researchers interested in estimating productivity can choose from an array of methodologies, each with its strengths … widely used techniques: (a) index numbers, (b) data envelopment analysis, and three parametric methods, (c) instrumental … evaluate three productivity debates using a panel of manufacturing plants in Colombia. The different methods generate …

In this paper we derive the standard error of a price index when both prices and tastes or technology are treated as … stochastic. Changing tastes or technology are a reason for the weights in the price index to be treated as stochastic, which can … function (with Sato-Vartia price index), and also the translog function (with Törnqvist price index), which proves to be more …

In this paper we employ index number theory in addressing the problem of adjusting real national income and real … domestic product for changes in a country's terms of trade. More specifically, using recent developments in the theory of … business sector;(ii) productivity growth or technical change; (iii) the effects on domestic real output of changes in the terms …

sector ownership has no independent impact on productivity growth. The finding that ownership per se does not matter, but …

Measures of long term trends in world export prices of manufactured goods and in the terms of trade between … United Nations export unit value index for manufactures, suggest that this measure overstates the long-run rise in …

the financial market (lagged world market portfolio rate of return, dividend yield, bond yield, short-term rate of …