One challenge of understanding the state of the economy is we don’t have clear measures. We attempt to gather accurate data but there is quite a bit of inaccuracy in the data (both from preliminary estimates – before all the data is in, which can take months, or longer – and just plain items we have to estimate no matter how long we have).
Related: Manufacturing Data – Accuracy Questions – Why China’s Economic Data is Questionable – What Do Unemployment Statistics Mean? – Manufacturing Jobs Data: USA and China – The Long-Term USA Federal Budget Outlook – Is China’s Recovery for Real?
Economists Seek to Fix a Defect in Data That Overstates the Nation’s Vigor
The problem is particularly acute in manufacturing. Imported components constitute an ever greater share of the computers, autos, appliances and other finished merchandise that roll off assembly lines in the United States – and an ever greater share of all of the nation’s imports.
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The stated goal, among those at the conference, is to repair the statistics, but that requires several years, lots of money (from Congress) to gather more information about what companies are doing, and whole new procedures for measuring imports. Much of the conference was devoted to an analysis of the gap between existing data and reality, and ways to close that gap.
The Measurement Issues Arising from the Growth of Globalization conference has thankfully provided open access to papers from the conference including:
Offshoring Bias: The Effect of Import Price Mismeasurement on Manufacturing Productivity by Susan Houseman (Upjohn Institute), Christopher Kurz (Federal Reserve Board), Paul Lengermann (Federal Reserve Board), and Benjamin Mandel (Federal Reserve Board)
Effects of Imported Intermediate Inputs on Productivity* by Lucy P. Eldridge and Michael J. Harper, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
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The Mismeasure of Manufacturing…
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