In 1994 the FOMC began to release statements after each meeting. This paper investigates whether the public'sviews about the current path of the economy and of future policy have been affected by changes in the Federal Reserve's communications policy as reflected in private sector's forecasts of...

This paper proposes a methodology for assessing the joint performance of multivariate forecasts of economic variables. The methodology is illustrated by comparing the rankings of forecasters by the Wall Street Journal with the authors' alternative rankings. The results show that the methodology...

In 1994 the FOMC began to release statements after each meeting. This paper investigates whether the public's views about the current path of the economy and of future policy have been affected by changes in the Federal Reserve's communications policy as reflected in private sector's forecasts...

Many economists believe that a central bank’s transparency about its objectives, economic outlook, and policy changes affect the public’s views about future economic and financial conditions. In keeping with this theory, since 1994 the Federal Open Market Committee has gradually increased...

If economic forecasts are to be used for decision making, then being able to evaluate their accuracy is essential. Assessing accuracy using single variables from a forecast is acceptable as a first pass, but this approach has inherent problems. This article addresses some of these problems by...

In 1994, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) began to release statements after each meeting. This paper investigates whether the public’s views about the current path of the economy and of future policy have been affected by changes in the Federal Reserve’s communications policy as...