A practical guide to understanding economic forecasts In Inside the Crystal Ball: How to Make and Use Forecasts, UBS Chief U.S. Economist Maury Harris helps readers improve their own forecasting abilities by examining the elements and processes that characterize successful and failed forecasts. The book: *Provides insights from Maury Harris, named among Bloomberg's 50 Most Influential People in Global Finance. *Demonstrates "best practices" in the assembly and evaluation of forecasts. Harris walks readers through the real-life steps he and other successful forecasters take in preparing their projections. These valuable procedures can help forecast users evaluate forecasts and forecasters as inputs for making their own specific business and investment decisions. *Emphasizes the critical role of judgment in improving projections derived from purely statistical methodologies. Harris explores the prerequisites for sound forecasting judgment a good sense of history and an understanding of contemporary theoretical frameworks in readable and illuminating detail. *Addresses everyday forecasting issues, including the credibility of government statistics and analyses, fickle consumers, and volatile business spirits. Harris also offers procedural guidelines for special circumstances, such as natural disasters, terrorist threats, gyrating oil and stock prices, and international economic crises. *Evaluates major contemporary forecasting issues including the now commonplace hypothesis of sustained economic sluggishness, possible inflation outcomes in an environment of falling unemployment, and projecting interest rates when central banks implement unprecedented low interest rate and quantitative easing (QE) policies. *Brings to life Harris's own experiences and those of other leading economists in his almost four-decade career as a professional economist and forecaster. Dr. Harris presents his personal recipes for long-term credibility and commercial success to anyone offering advice about the future.

The European public debt problem was in the making long before the 2007-2009 recession, as budget deficits had become endemic. A similar crisis is now developing in America, where the same fundamental causes have been at work. The Public Debt Problem analyzes the situation of public debts in America and reviews official forecasts for the federal government. The author carefully explains the main concepts (budget deficit, public debt, etc.) and analytical tools (discounting, government accounting, Treasury securities, bonds, yields, etc.) necessary to understand the issues.

The degree to which markets incorporate information is one of the most important questions facing economists today. This book provides a fascinating study of the existence and extent of information efficiency in financial markets, with a special focus on betting markets. Betting markets are selected for study because they incorporate features highly appropriate to a study of information efficiency, in particular the fact that each bet has a well-defined end point at which its value becomes certain. Using international examples, this book reviews and analyses the issue of information efficiency in both financial and betting markets. Part I is an extensive survey of the existing literature, while Part II presents a range of readings by leading academics. Insights gained from the book will interest students of financial economics, financial market analysts, mathematicians and statisticians, and all those with a special interest in finance or gambling.

Economic Forecasting provides a comprehensive overview of macroeconomic forecasting. The focus is first on a wide range of theories as well as empirical methods: business cycle analysis, time series methods, macroeconomic models, medium and long-run projections, fiscal and financial forecasts, and sectoral forecasting.

This book offers a wide-ranging overview of the state of labour market forecasting in selected OECD countries. Besides presenting forecasting models, the contributions provide an introduction to past experiences of forecasting, highlight the requirements for building appropriate data sets and present the most up-to-date forecasts available. In most cases the forecasts project mismatches in the labour market as they are likely to occur in the coming years with respect to occupational groups, qualifications and employment in specific sectors. The authors demonstrate how these insights might be used to help reduce employment risks both for the individual worker and the national labour market as a whole. The country examples also show how information on labour market trends is disseminated and used by various actors, such as policymakers, firms and individuals. In a world of rapid structural change, the results of the research presented in this book could help cushion the impact of potential shocks from future mismatches and skill shortages in the job market. Policymakers at the supranational, national and regional level, and academics in the fields of labour market theory and policy can all draw valuable information from this insightful study.

Applied Econometrics: A Practical Guide is an extremely user-friendly and application-focused book on econometrics. Unlike many econometrics textbooks which are heavily theoretical on abstractions, this book is perfect for beginners and promises simplicity and practicality to the understanding of econometric models. Written in an easy-to-read manner, the book begins with hypothesis testing and moves forth to simple and multiple regression models. It also includes advanced topics: Endogeneity and Two-stage Least Squares Simultaneous Equations Models Panel Data Models Qualitative and Limited Dependent Variable Models Vector Autoregressive (VAR) Models Autocorrelation and ARCH/GARCH Models Unit Root and Cointegration The book also illustrates the use of computer software (EViews, SAS and R) for economic estimating and modeling. Its practical applications make the book an instrumental, go-to guide for solid foundation in the fundamentals of econometrics. In addition, this book includes excerpts from relevant articles published in top-tier academic journals. This integration of published articles helps the readers to understand how econometric models are applied to real-world use cases.

First published in 1913, Richard Parry's Valuation and Investment Tables has since become an essential tool for students and professionals in the study and practice of valuation and appraisal. That the book reached its centenary year in print and now fourteenth edition is a testament to its acclaim by the valuation and property professionals in an era of calculators and computers, and furthermore a tribute to the historical importance of Parry's original vision and continued legacy. The purpose of the book is to provide a comprehensive range of different valuation and investment tables in one volume. Although many of the tables will be used by practicing surveyors for valuation purposes, they will also be useful to accountants and others concerned with various types of investment and financial calculations. Surveyors valuing freehold or leasehold interests in property have the choice of using either (a) annually in arrear, or (b) quarterly in advance figures of years' purchase. The relevant tables for each concept are printed on different coloured edged pages for ease of reference. In practice today, calculations are required for a variety of purposes which often justify more than one approach. To allow for this, Internal Rates of Return tables have been retained. Using these tables, both growth and non-growth scenarios can be analysed for more detailed appraisal of specific freehold properties and to provide a basis for more in-depth investment advice.

To fully function in today's global real estate industry, students and professionals increasingly need to understand how to implement essential and cutting-edge quantitative techniques. This book presents an easy-to-read guide to applying quantitative analysis in real estate aimed at non-cognate undergraduate and masters students, and meets the requirements of modern professional practice. Through case studies and examples illustrating applications using data sourced from dedicated real estate information providers and major firms in the industry, the book provides an introduction to the foundations underlying statistical data analysis, common data manipulations and understanding descriptive statistics, before gradually building up to more advanced quantitative analysis, modelling and forecasting of real estate markets. Our examples and case studies within the chapters have been specifically compiled for this book and explicitly designed to help the reader acquire a better understanding of the quantitative methods addressed in each chapter. Our objective is to equip readers with the skills needed to confidently carry out their own quantitative analysis and be able to interpret empirical results from academic work and practitioner studies in the field of real estate and in other asset classes. Both undergraduate and masters level students, as well as real estate analysts in the professions, will find this book to be essential reading.

China is historically famous for its high demographic dividend and its huge working population, and this has driven tremendous economic growth over the past few decades. However, that population has begun to shrink and the Lewis turning point whereby surplus rural population has been absorbed into manufacturing is also approaching, leading to great change in the Chinese labor market. Will this negatively affect China's economic growth? Can the "Middle-Income Trap" be avoided? What reforms should be made on the labor supply side? This book tackles these key questions. This book is a collection of 14 papers presenting the author's observations, analysis, and opinions of China's long-term economic development from the demographic perspective, while analysing real economic problems from the past and including policy recommendations. It provides a critical reference for scholars and students interested in Chinese economic development and demographic perspectives on economic development.

This book, and its companion volume in the Econometric Society Monographs series (ESM number 32), present a collection of papers by Clive W. J. Granger. His contributions to economics and econometrics, many of them seminal, span more than four decades and touch on all aspects of time series analysis. The papers assembled in this volume explore topics in causality, integration and cointegration, and long memory. Those in the companion volume investigate themes in causality, integration and cointegration, and long memory. The two volumes contain the original articles as well as an introduction written by the editors.

This book, and its companion volume, present a collection of papers by Clive W.J. Granger. His contributions to economics and econometrics, many of them seminal, span more than four decades and touch on all aspects of time series analysis. The papers assembled in this volume explore topics in spectral analysis, seasonality, nonlinearity, methodology, and forecasting. Those in the companion volume investigate themes in causality, integration and cointegration, and long memory. The two volumes contain the original articles as well as an introduction written by the editors.

This book, and its companion volume, present a collection of papers by Clive W.J. Granger. His contributions to economics and econometrics, many of them seminal, span more than four decades and touch on all aspects of time series analysis. The papers assembled in this volume explore topics in causality, integration and cointegration, and long memory. Those in the companion volume investigate themes in causality, integration and cointegration, and long memory. The two volumes contain the original articles as well as an introduction written by the editors.

"Economic Forecasting" deals with macroeconomic forecasts from a global point of view. The focus is first on a large range of theories as well as empirical methods: business cycle analysis, time series methods, macroeconomic models, medium and long-run projections, fiscal and financial forecasts, and sectoral forecasting. In addition, the book addresses the main issues surrounding the use of forecasts (accuracy, communication challenges) and their policy implications. A synthetic overview of economic data and forecasting institutions is also provided.

This book provides a formal analysis of the models, procedures, and measures of economic forecasting with a view to improving forecasting practice. David Hendry and Michael Clements base the analyses on assumptions pertinent to the economies to be forecast, viz. a non-constant, evolving economic system, and econometric models whose form and structure are unknown a priori. The authors find that conclusions which can be established formally for constant-parameter stationary processes and correctly-specified models often do not hold when unrealistic assumptions are relaxed. Despite the difficulty of proceeding formally when models are mis-specified in unknown ways for non-stationary processes that are subject to structural breaks, Hendry and Clements show that significant insights can be gleaned. For example, a formal taxonomy of forecasting errors can be developed, the role of causal information clarified, intercept corrections re-established as a method for achieving robustness against forms of structural change, and measures of forecast accuracy re-interpreted.

The material contained in this book originated in interrogations about modern practice in time series analysis. * Why do we use models optimized with respect to one-step ahead foreca- ing performances for applications involving multi-step ahead forecasts? * Why do we infer 'long-term' properties (unit-roots) of an unknown process from statistics essentially based on short-term one-step ahead forecasting performances of particular time series models? * Are we able to detect turning-points of trend components earlier than with traditional signal extraction procedures? The link between 'signal extraction' and the first two questions above is not immediate at first sight. Signal extraction problems are often solved by su- ably designed symmetric filters. Towards the boundaries (t = 1 or t = N) of a time series a particular symmetric filter must be approximated by asymm- ric filters. The time series literature proposes an intuitively straightforward solution for solving this problem: * Stretch the observed time series by forecasts generated by a model. * Apply the symmetric filter to the extended time series. This approach is called 'model-based'. Obviously, the forecast-horizon grows with the length of the symmetric filter. Model-identification and estimation of unknown parameters are then related to the above first two questions. One may further ask, if this approximation problem and the way it is solved by model-based approaches are important topics for practical purposes? Consider some 'prominent' estimation problems: * The determination of the seasonally adjusted actual unemployment rate.

In 1950 the world population was 2.5 billion; fifty years later there are over 6 billion people. The demographic of this explosion has essentially occurred in the developing areas of the world. The key to understanding many contemporary development problems that have arisen from this rapid growth is in understanding the relationships between population and the economy.
This book offers an analysis of such relationships, encompassing a review of the major positions in the academic debate.
Population, Economic Growth and Agriculture in Less Developed Countries will serve as a useful introduction and reference tool for students, academics and all with an interest in the population debate and economics.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203103106

In the completely revised second edition of this highly praised book, Susumu Yabuki, one of Japan's leading China experts, and Stephen M. Harner, A Shanghai-based investment banker, present a comprehensive and accessible analysis of China's political economy.The authors provide dozens of easy-to-grasp and up-to-date graphs, charts, tables, and maps to illustrate the reality of China, as they explain and comment on political, economic, financial and trade trends.Placing issues in historical perspective, and with a view to trends into the twenty-first century, the authors survey the realities of China's area and population, agriculture, energy needs, pollution, industrial structure, township and village enterprises, state-owned enterprise reform, unemployment, economic regions, foreign investment, state finances, fiscal and monetary policy, China's financial institutions, foreign financial institutions in China, stock markets, international finance, balance of payments and exchange rate policy, corporate finance, the role of Shanghai, government institution reform, foreign trade, the roles of Hong Kong and Taiwan, U.S.-China relations, and Japan-China relations.Useful as an introduction to China's economics, finance, and politics for students, and as a desktop reference volume for corporations, organizations, and individuals considering doing business in China, this unique study fills a genuine gap in the literature.

We live in a world where capital is free to move. Increasingly this determines the pattern of international growth. Savings are invested in the country yielding the highest return, thus adding to its stock of capital. This development is espe- cially true of common markets such as the European Union, which are based on free trade and financial openness. The present monograph deals with internatio- nal growth, featuring the dynamics of foreign debt and domestic capital. I had many helpful talks with my colleagues at Hamburg: Michael Schmid (now at Bamberg), Franco Reither, Wolf Schlifer, Thomas Straubhaar and Johannes Hackmann. In addition, Michael Brauninger and Philipp Lichtenauer carefully discussed with me all parts of the manuscript. Last but not least, Doris Ehrich did the secretarial work as excellently as ever. I wish to thank all of them. Contents INTRODUCTION 3 BRIEF SURVEY OF THE LITERATURE 9 SMALL OPEN ECONOMY 15 CHAPTER I. 1. Solow Model 15 1.1. Foreign Assets 15 1.1.1. Steady State 15 Process of Adjustment 25 1.1.2.

A comprehensive collection of the field's most provocative, influential new work Business Forecasting compiles some of the field's important and influential literature into a single, comprehensive reference for forecast modeling and process improvement. It is packed with provocative ideas from forecasting researchers and practitioners, on topics including accuracy metrics, benchmarking, modeling of problem data, and overcoming dysfunctional behaviors. Its coverage includes often-overlooked issues at the forefront of research, such as uncertainty, randomness, and forecastability, as well as emerging areas like data mining for forecasting. The articles present critical analysis of current practices and consideration of new ideas. With a mix of formal, rigorous pieces and brief introductory chapters, the book provides practitioners with a comprehensive examination of the current state of the business forecasting field. Forecasting performance is ultimately limited by the 'forecastability' of the data. Yet failing to recognize this, many organizations continue to squander resources pursuing unachievable levels of accuracy. This book provides a wealth of ideas for improving all aspects of the process, including the avoidance of wasted efforts that fail to improve (or even harm) forecast accuracy. * Analyzes the most prominent issues in business forecasting * Investigates emerging approaches and new methods of analysis * Combines forecasts to improve accuracy * Utilizes Forecast Value Added to identify process inefficiency The business environment is evolving, and forecasting methods must evolve alongside it. This compilation delivers an array of new tools and research that can enable more efficient processes and more accurate results. Business Forecasting provides an expert's-eye view of the field's latest developments to help you achieve your desired business outcomes.

Fad-Free Strategy provides a ground-breaking approach to making better business strategy decisions: more efficient, open to out-of-the-box opportunities and evidence-based. Most strategy books focus on Grand Strategy, the process that leads to high-level recommendations or, more accurately, hypotheses about where and how to compete. While this book briefly covers critical Grand Strategy practices, it deep dives into Operational Strategy, the process of validation, adaptation and possible rejection of those hypotheses. Operational Strategy is based on an in-depth understanding of customer preferences and anticipating the choices they make. Those choices rather than managers' ambitions determine whether a strategy will generate the aspired financial results. The book explains, by means of detailed real-world cases across industries, how to generate validated solutions to any strategic problem such as: how to enter successfully into new markets, either as an innovator or as a latecomer? How to defend one's position against aggressive new entrants? Or how to sustain margins when price is the only thing customers seem to care about? This remarkable book contains expert advice from accomplished strategic advisors and thought leaders Daniel Deneffe and Herman Vantrappen. Fad Free Strategy will be a useful tool for smart business executives at mainstream companies who are disappointed with strategy fads and simplistic solutions based on cherry-picked, anecdotal evidence from today's hero companies. It will also appeal to economics faculty members teaching graduate courses in business strategy who are looking for an economics-based strategy textbook that is both rigorous and comprehensive. The book's core ideas have been taught successfully in continuing and executive education programs at Harvard University and Hult International Business School.

Global construction data is vital for contractors, governments, international organisations, policy makers, academic researchers and statisticians. As the global population of the world expands, the sustainability of the built environment raises the political agenda and the need to manage infrastructure and buildings in both urban and rural contexts becomes ever more pressing. How much more can the built environment grow and how can it be managed sustainably? This edited volume addresses how we can find a possible way through the inconsistencies between national construction data sets to devise a consistent approach to national construction data to further the global sustainability agenda and inform policy making. This search begins in Part I, which looks at the methods and definitions used in construction statistics in different countries. Part II considers examples of different types of construction data from the cost of materials, measuring work on high rise buildings and existing stock. In Part III, the authors consider construction data internationally, beginning with the problem of comparing data in different countries using exchange rates and purchasing power parities (PPPs), comparing innovation processes in different countries and looking at the provision of building design internationally. In Part IV, the international theme is continued by comparing accounting practices and company performance in different countries and concludes with an international comparison of construction industries. This book raises awareness of the significance of the construction industry globally and the importance of data to measure it. It informs the discussion of the best ways of handling the consequences of policies affecting the built environment and the effect of the built environment on the rest of the economy and society. It is essential reading for international economists, construction industry consultants, policy makers, construction statisticians and academics.

A critical examination of The prevailing orthodoxy according to which all macroeconomic theory should be reducible to microeconomics. The book provides a mathematical extension of the Lucas theory to allow for the effects of creation of knowledge upon economic development so as to improve the prediction of business cycle data.

1. Introduction and overview Until still few years ago, economic growth theory (going back to Solow, 1956; for an introduction cf. Burmeister and Dobell, 1970) predicted convergence of both growth rates and level of per capita income of economies which share identical preferences, technologies and same population growth rates, independently of initial conditions. Countries with a low capital stock grow faster than those with a higher capital stock, until, in the long-run, they all converge to a common constant growth rate. This prediction is due to the way how growth is "explained" in models of this kind. Growth of output per capita resulted, in the simplest model, from an exogenous growth oflabour productivity (see e. g. Sala-i-Martin, 1990; Grossman and Helpman, 1991a, ch. 2). Si 1ce this increase of productivity is exogenously given, the model itselfdoes not give any explanation ofits source. The prediction ofconvergence ofgrowth rates, itself, is very doubtful and observations show, that on an international level either convergence is not given at all, or that it takes a very long time. The literature of the "new" theory of growth provides a rich variety of models whose theoretical implications range from divergence to convergence and thus offers much better working tools in order to analyze real world observations. These models (starting with Romer, 1986 and Lucas, 1988) explain growth of GNP or per capita income from within the model by includingexternal effects such as a public stock ofknowledge capital (e. g.

The conventional wisdom on how technology will change the future is wrong. Mark Mills lays out a radically different and optimistic vision for what's really coming. The mainstream forecasts fall into three camps. One considers today as the "new normal," where ordering a ride or food on a smartphone or trading in bitcoins is as good as it's going to get. Another foresees a dystopian era of widespread, digitally driven job- and business-destruction. A third believes that the only technological revolution that matters will be found with renewable energy and electric cars. But according to Mills, a convergence of technologies will instead drive an economic boom over the coming decade, one that historians will characterize as the "Roaring 2020s." It will come not from any single big invention, but from the confluence of radical advances in three primary technology domains: microprocessors, materials, and machines. Microprocessors are increasingly embedded in everything. Materials, from which everything is built, are emerging with novel, almost magical capabilities. And machines, which make and move all manner of stuff, are undergoing a complementary transformation. Accelerating and enabling all of this is the Cloud, history's biggest infrastructure, which is itself based on the building blocks of next-generation microprocessors and artificial intelligence. We've seen this pattern before. The technological revolution that drove the great economic expansion of the twentieth century can be traced to a similar confluence, one that was first visible in the 1920s: a new information infrastructure (telephony), new machines (cars and power plants), and new materials (plastics and pharmaceuticals). Single inventions don't drive great, long-cycle booms. It always takes convergent revolutions in technology's three core spheres-information, materials, and machines. Over history, that's only happened a few times. We have wrung much magic from the technologies that fueled the last long boom. But the great convergence now underway will ignite the 2020s. And this time, unlike any previous historical epoch, we have the Cloud amplifying everything. The next long boom starts now.