Economics
Google data offers real-time indicator of business closures, says BoC research
Google Places database can reveal whether businesses are gone for good or just “hibernating”
Labour market news matters for business cycle – BoE paper
Findings suggest previous focus on productivity is too narrow
Economics Benchmarks 2021 report – executive summary
Covid-19 coloured central banks’ views on the governance of their economics function in the past year
Turkey’s Dornbusch moment
Turkey’s new deposit scheme sets the stage for hyperinflation, writes Barry Eichengreen
BoE paper warns of ‘non-standard errors’
Researchers may introduce additional errors to data samples through their analysis
Fed’s Waller says federal funds rate should rise soon after QE ends
Fed governor hints at tighter policy and offers lessons from the pandemic
IMF paper emphasises importance of carbon pricing
Authors say carbon tax would be “more efficient and easier to administer” than other options
Economics Benchmarks 2021 report – making sense of the modern economy
Covid-19 coloured central banks’ views on their economics function
Larger research teams tend to publish more
Central banks with bigger teams report greater publishing volumes, but variation remains
Advanced economies draw on wider range of models
DSGE models and newer techniques more common at advanced economy central banks
US inflation reaches new peak
CPI figure hits 6.8%, the highest rate in nearly four decades
Quarterly forecast updates predominate
Frequency of forecasts varies more widely in emerging markets
Labour market changes key to inflation – BIS’s Shin
Central banks may face “race against time” to prevent wage-price spiral, says Hyun Song Shin
Data services centralised at minority of central banks
Central data governance and technology services used by three in 10 central banks
BdF paper looks at use of capital controls and foreign reserves
Many countries combine both to moderate effects of international capital flows
Alternative data fuels central bank research
Important research areas include monetary transmission, exchange rates, digitisation, SMEs and more
Pandemic spurred use of alternative data
Advanced and emerging market economies prioritise different applications
Unemployment forecast by minority of emerging market economy nations
Data highlights differences based on local economic circumstances
One in five central bank economists have a PhD
Central banks in Africa lag behind peers in sponsoring PhD programmes
Eurozone officials call for major fiscal changes
Stability and Growth Pact is hampering policy, speakers at ECB conference argue
Covid-19 causes bigger growth forecast errors
But central banks perform better at forecasting inflation
Eurozone unemployment declines to 7.3%
Youth unemployment rate also falls but is much higher at 15.9%
Economist salaries outpace GDP per capita
Salaries were six times higher than GDP per capita, on average
Eurozone QE helped increase R&D spending, paper finds
Firms that had bonds bought by the ECB increased R&D spending by 9% on average