Real economy and forecasting

• Which Model to Forecast the Target Rate?

  Staff working paper 2017-60 Bruno Feunou, Jean-Sébastien Fontaine, Jianjian Jin

  Specifications of the Federal Reserve target rate that have more realistic features mitigate in-sample over-fitting and are favored in the data.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers JEL Code(s): E, E4, E43 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Economic models, Monetary policy, Monetary policy framework and transmission, Real economy and forecasting

• Is the Discretionary Income Effect of Oil Price Shocks a Hoax?

  Staff working paper 2017-50 Christiane Baumeister, Lutz Kilian, Xiaoqing Zhou

  The transmission of oil price shocks has been a question of central interest in macroeconomics since the 1970s. There has been renewed interest in this question after the large and persistent fall in the real price of oil in 2014–16. In the context of this debate, Ramey (2017) makes the striking claim that the existing literature on the transmission of oil price shocks is fundamentally confused about the question of how to quantify the effect of oil price shocks.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers JEL Code(s): C, C5, C51, Q, Q4, Q43 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Econometric, statistical and computational methods, Economic models, Monetary policy, Inflation dynamics and pressures, Real economy and forecasting

• Product Sophistication and the Slowdown in Chinese Export Growth

  Staff discussion paper 2017-15 Mark Kruger, Walter Steingress, Sri Thanabalasingam

  Chinese real export growth decelerated considerably during the last decade. This paper argues that the slowdown largely resulted from China moving to a more sophisticated mix of exports: China produced more sophisticated goods over which it had pricing power instead of producing greater volumes of less sophisticated products.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff discussion papers JEL Code(s): F, F1, F14, F17, O, O1, O10 Research Theme(s): Monetary policy, Real economy and forecasting, Structural challenges, International trade, finance and competitiveness

• Evaluating Real GDP Growth Forecasts in the Bank of Canada Monetary Policy Report

  Staff analytical note 2017-21 André Binette, Dmitri Tchebotarev

  This paper examines the quality of projections of real GDP growth taken from the Bank of Canada Monetary Policy Report (MPR) since they were first published in 1997. Over the last decade, it has become common practice among the central banking community to discuss forecast performance publicly.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes JEL Code(s): C, C5, C52, E, E3, E32, E37, E5, E52 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Econometric, statistical and computational methods, Economic models, Monetary policy, Real economy and forecasting

• Alternative Scenario to the October 2017 MPR Base-Case Projection: Higher Potential Growth

  Staff analytical note 2017-18 Jing Yang, Ben Tomlin, Olivier Gervais

  We construct an alternative scenario in which trend labour input and business investment are stronger than that expected in the Bank of Canada’s base-case projection in the October 2017 Monetary Policy Report.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes JEL Code(s): E, E2, E22, E24, E27, E5 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Economic models, Monetary policy, Real economy and forecasting, Structural challenges, Demographics and labour supply

• Low Inflation in Advanced Economies: Facts and Drivers

  Staff analytical note 2017-16 Sanjana Bhatnagar, Anne-Katherine Cormier, Patrisha de Leon-Manlagnit, Elise Martin, Vikram Rai, Renaud St-Cyr, Subrata Sarker, Kristina Hess

  Since the global financial crisis, core inflation has been persistently below target in most advanced economies. Recently, it has weakened further in several advanced economies despite gradually diminishing slack. This note reviews recent developments in core inflation across advanced economies and identifies distinctive patterns across regions.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes JEL Code(s): E, E0, E3, E31, F, F0 Research Theme(s): Monetary policy, Inflation dynamics and pressures, Real economy and forecasting

• Redistributive Effects of a Change in the Inflation Target

  Staff analytical note 2017-13 Robert Amano, Thomas J. Carter, Yaz Terajima

  In light of the financial crisis and its aftermath, several economists have argued that inflation-targeting central banks should reconsider the level of their inflation targets. While the appropriate level for the inflation target remains an open question, it’s important to note that any transition to a new target would entail certain costs.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff analytical notes JEL Code(s): E, E5, E52, E58 Research Theme(s): Monetary policy, Inflation dynamics and pressures, Monetary policy framework and transmission, Real economy and forecasting

• Government Spending Multipliers Under the Zero Lower Bound: Evidence from Japan

  Staff working paper 2017-40 Thuy Lan Nguyen, Dmitriy Sergeyev, Wataru Miyamoto

  Using a rich data set on government spending forecasts in Japan, we provide new evidence on the effects of unexpected changes in government spending when the nominal interest rate is near the zero lower bound (ZLB).

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers JEL Code(s): E, E3, E32, E5, E6, E62 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Economic models, Monetary policy, Monetary policy framework and transmission, Real economy and forecasting

• What’s Up with Unit Non-Response in the Bank of Canada’s Business Outlook Survey? The Effect of Staff Tenure

  Staff discussion paper 2017-11 Sarah Miller, David Amirault, Laurent Martin

  Since 1997, the Bank of Canada’s regional offices have been conducting the Business Outlook Survey (BOS), a quarterly survey of business conditions. Survey responses are gathered through face-to-face, confidential consultations with a sample of private sector firms representative of the various sectors, firm sizes and regions across Canada.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff discussion papers JEL Code(s): C, C2, C21, C8, C81, D, D2, D22 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Econometric, statistical and computational methods, Monetary policy, Real economy and forecasting

• Changes in Monetary Regimes and the Identification of Monetary Policy Shocks: Narrative Evidence from Canada

  Staff working paper 2017-39 Julien Champagne, Rodrigo Sekkel

  We use narrative evidence along with a novel database of real-time data and forecasts from the Bank of Canada's staff economic projections from 1974 to 2015 to construct a new measure of monetary policy shocks and estimate the effects of monetary policy in Canada.

  Content Type(s): Staff research, Staff working papers JEL Code(s): E, E3, E31, E32, E4, E43, E5, E52, E58 Research Theme(s): Models and tools, Economic models, Monetary policy, Monetary policy framework and transmission, Monetary policy tools and implementation, Real economy and forecasting