Macroeconomics Forecasts and Microeconomic Forecasters

Owen Lamont

NBER Working Paper No. 5284
Issued in October 1995
NBER Program(s):   ME

In the presence of principal-agent problems, published macroeconomic forecasts by professional economists may not measure expectations. Forecasters may use their forecasts in order to manipulate beliefs about their ability. I test a cross-sectional implication of models of reputation and information-revelation. I find that as forecasters become older and more established, they produce more radical forecasts. Since these more radical forecasts are in general less accurate, ex post forecast accuracy grows significantly worse as forecasters become older and more established. These findings indicate that reputational factors are at work in professional macroeconomic forecasts.

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Document Object Identifier (DOI): 10.3386/w5284

Published: Lamont, Owen A. "Macroeconomic Forecasts And Microeconomic Forecasters," Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 2002, v48(3,Jul), 265-280. citation courtesy of

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