Production capital and technology (i.e., total factor productivity) in U.S. manufacturing are fundamental for understanding output and productivity growth of the U.S. economy but are unobserved at this level of aggregation and must be estimated before being used in empirical analysis....

In 2002, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) introduced a supplemental C-CPI-U employing a superlative formula to provide a closer approximation to a cost-of-living index (COLI). This paper focuses on whether the BLS can improve upon the headline CPI-U’s current biennial weight update...

In this paper, we first comment on the recent (1996) report of the Advisory Commission to Study the Consumer Price Index, appointed by the U.S. Senate Finance Committee, and the recommendations it contains. We then describe some of the initiatives currently underway at the Bureau of Labor...

The author provides a BLS response to the Boskin Commission from the perspective of ten years following the release of the report. He documents the research on price indexes done at the BLS in the first half of the 1990s that pointed to upward CPI bias, and discusses how these results eventually...

This paper examines the accuracy of the home purchase component of the Consumer Price Index. Alternative monthly index series are simulated over the period 1973-1978 using FHA Master Statistical File data. Hedonic indexes derived from monthly regressions are compared to series constructed by the...

This study provides fresh evidence on the responsiveness of private consumption and, by implication, saving to government deficits. It focuses on consumption and saving from 1981 to 1989, a period during which the personal saving rate was characterized as surprisingly unresponsive to high...

"Previous research generally concludes that early participants in the Social Security system received a very good "deal"-better than later participants received, and much better than future participants are likely to get. However, researchers do not know the values of those deals and their...

In this paper we provide new and detailed evidence on the impact on the U.S. CPI of the appearance and growth of new types of product outlets. Using actual CPI microdata for 2002-2007, we find that the changing mix of outlets had a statistically significantly negative impact on average prices in...