Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/58368 
Year of Publication: 
2009
Series/Report no.: 
Working Paper No. 09-18
Publisher: 
University of California, Department of Economics, Davis, CA
Abstract: 
The Business Cycle Dating Committee (BCDC) of the National Bureau of Economic Research provides a historical chronology of business cycle turning points. This paper investigates three central aspects about this chronology: (1) How skillful is the BCDC in classifying economic activity into expansions and recessions? (2) Which indices of business conditions best capture the current but unobservable state of the business cycle? And (3) Which indicators predict future turning points best and at what horizons? We answer each of these questions in detail with methods novel to economics designed to assess classification ability. In the process we clarify several important features of business cycle phenomena.
Subjects: 
business cycle turning points
Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) curve
Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research
JEL: 
E32
E37
C14
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.