Publikationen Prognose und Konjunkturpolitik

Export-Led Growth in Chile: Assessing the Role of Export Composition in Productivity Growth

This study examines the export-led growth hypothesis using annual time-series data from Chile in a production function framework. It addresses the limitations of the existing literature and focuses on the impact of manufactured and primary exports on productivity growth. In order to investigate if and how manufactured and primary exports affect economic growth via increases in productivity, several ...

On the Estimation and Forecasting of International Migration: How Relevant is Heterogeneity across Countries?

This paper performs a comparative analysis of estimation as well as of out-of-sample forecasting results of more than 20 estimators common in the panel data literature using the data on migration to Germany from 18 source countries in the period 1967-2001. Our results suggest that the choice of an estimation procedure has a substantial impact on the parameter estimates of the migration function. Out-of-sample ...

On the Forecasting Properties of the Alternative Leading Indicators for the German GDP: Recent Evidence

In this paper we perform a comparative study of the forecasting properties of the about 30 alternative leading indicators for Germany using the growth rates of German real GDP. In addition to them, we have constructed a diffusion index based on the principal component analysis and including 145 component series that reflect all the facets of German economy. We use the post-unification data which cover ...

Growth and Inflation Forecasts for Germany: A Panel-Based Assessment of Accuracy and Efficiency

We analyse forecasts of professional forecasters for Germany regarding the time span from 1970 to 2004. This novel panel data set renders it possible to assess the accuracy and efficiency of growth and inflation forecasts more efficiently than in previous studies. We argue that the forecasts are, on average, unbiased and weakly - but not strongly - efficient. Using model confidence sets suggested by ...

Home-Market and Factor-Endowment Effects in a Gravity Approach

This paper shows how the home-market effect can be estimated in the generalized gravity equation of Bergstrand, taking into account traditional comparative advantage effects arising from differences in factor endowment. The empirical results suggest the presence of significant home-market effects for differentiated goods in many manufacturing industries which may be capital intensive or labour intensive. ...

The Argentinean Currency Crisis: A Markov-Switching Model Estimation

In 2002, the Argentinean currency board came to a sudden and dramatic end. Although the country had been suffering from weak economic fundamentals for years, the timing and severity of the currency crisis surprised most observers. The present study analyzes the role of fundamentals and self-fulfilling speculation in the Argentinean crisis. Arguing within a theoretical model of a fixed exchange rate ...

When Do Forecasters Disagree? An Assessment of German Growth and Inflation Forecast Dispersion

Based on a panel of German professional forecasts for 1970-2004 we analyse the dispersion of growth and inflation forecasts. Forecast dispersion varies over time and is particularly high before and during recessions. There is no clear link between forecast dispersion and the subsequent forecast error. Forecast dispersion is positively correlated with the volatility of macroeconomic variables, but not ...

Declining Output Volatility in Germany: Impulses, Propagation and the Role of Monetary Policy

The decline in output volatility in Germany is analysed. A lower level of variance in an autoregressive model of output growth can be either due to a change in the structure of the economy (a change in the propagation mechanism) or a reduced error term variance (reduced impulses). In Germany the decline output volatility is due to a decline in the persistence of the growth process. This is in contrast ...

Forecasting the German Cyclical Turning Points: Dynamic Bi-Factor Model with Markov Switching

International Market Integration for Natural Gas? A Cointegration Analysis of Prices in Europe, North America and Japan

This paper investigates the degree of integration of natural gas markets in Europe, North America and Japan in the time period between the early 1990s and 2004. The relationship between international gas market prices and their relation to the oil price are explored through principal components analysis and Johansen likelihood-based cointegration procedure. Both of them show a high level of natural ...