Although there have been many evaluations of the Fed Greenbook forecasts, we analyze them in a different dimension. We examine the revisions of these forecasts in the context of fixed event predictions to determine how new information is incorporated in the forecasting process. This analysis...

In this paper we present a multivariate analysis of the Federal Reserve’s forecasts. First, we evaluate the Fed’s forecasts of the ten major expenditure categories of real GDP. Second, we present a new methodology for evaluating multivariate forecasts. Finally, we use the same...

This paper evaluates the potential impact of forecast errors on policy. We jointly evaluate the Federal Reserve staff forecasts of U.S. real output growth and the inflation rate in the context of the Taylor (1993) monetary policy rule. Our simple methodology generates “policy forecast...

Recent research has documented that the Federal Reserve produces systematic errors in forecasting inflation, real GDP growth, and the unemployment rate, even though these forecasts are unbiased. We show that these systematic errors reveal that the Fed is “surprised” by real and inflationary...

This paper presents a new approach to evaluating multiple economic forecasts. In the past, evaluations have focused on the forecasts of individual variables. However, many macroeconomic variables are forecast at the same time and are used together to describe the state of the economy. It is,...