How much can we trust China’s investment statistics?

Abstract

Building upon recent research into the underestimation of China’s official final consumption expenditure, this paper investigates the quality of China’s investment data. We strictly follow the official method to estimate the annual gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) expenditure from 2004 to 2012, and the resulting figures are significantly different from the official statistics. This implies that the ‘total investment in fixed assets’ data, which are the primary source for the estimation of GFCF, grossly exaggerate actual investments, and that the official GFCF figures are not, strictly speaking, independently estimated, as they are purported to be. We deduce that the official gross capital formation figure is more or less a residual item obtained by subtracting final consumption and net exports from the official GDP figure that is calculated based on the production-cum-income approach. As a result, the underestimation of China’s consumption expenditure automatically translates into overestimation of investment expenditure. We conclude that China’s official consumption and investment statistics cannot be trusted as the basis for policy discussions and academic research.     

High-frequency credit spread information and macroeconomic forecast revision

We examine whether professional forecasters incorporate high-frequency information about credit conditions when revising their economic forecasts. Using a mixed data sampling regression approach, we find that daily credit spreads have significant predictive ability for monthly forecast revisions of output growth, at both the aggregate and individual forecast levels. The relationships are shown to be notably strong during ‘bad’ economic conditions, which suggests that forecasters anticipate more pronounced effects of credit tightening during economic downturns, indicating an amplification effect of financial developments on macroeconomic aggregates. The forecasts do not incorporate all financial information received in equal measures, implying the presence of information rigidities in the incorporation of credit spread information.     

政府质量、科技创新与绿色GDP——中国省际空间溢出效应及区域差异对比

通过构建嵌入政府质量和科技创新因素的经济增长模型，利用中国30个省份2004~2017年的平衡面板数据，实证检验政府质量、科技创新对绿色GDP发展的影响。研究发现：中国绿色GDP存在显著的空间集聚性及明显的区域差异性。在经济权重矩阵影响下，不同地区的政府效率、市场化程度、公平程度和腐败程度对绿色GDP的影响不同，其中政府效率、公平程度能有效促进经济发展较好地区的绿色GDP增长，却会抑制比较落后地区绿色GDP的增长；市场化程度对大部分地区绿色GDP呈现促进作用；腐败程度对地区绿色GDP增长呈阻碍作用。科技创新对各地区绿色GDP均起到积极的促进作用。因此，提升绿色GDP发展水平不仅需要提高地方政府质量，为绿色GDP发展提供符合实际的政策指导意见，还需激活企业科技创新能力，为绿色GDP发展提供有力科技保障。     

Forecasting China's GDP growth using dynamic factors and mixed-frequency data

Forecasting GDP growth is important and necessary for Chinese government to set GDP growth target. To fully and efficiently utilize macroeconomic and financial information, this paper attempts to forecast China's GDP growth using dynamic predictors and mixed-frequency data. The dynamic factor model is first applied to select dynamic predictors among large amount of monthly macroeconomic and daily financial data and then the mixed data sampling regression is applied to forecast quarterly GDP growth based on the selected monthly and daily predictors. Empirical results show that forecasts using dynamic predictors and mixed-frequency data have better accuracy comparing to traditional forecasting methods. Moreover, forecasts with leads and forecast combination can further improve forecast performance.     

From a System of National Accounts to a Process of National Wellbeing Accounting

There are repeated calls to go ‘Beyond GDP’, for measures of wellbeing and progress in addition to those that the System of National Accounts (SNA) is designed to provide. We identify key issues that can help build on the rigour of SNA whilst fitting the measurement of economic performance within a broader assessment of national wellbeing and progress. Such drivers are already leading to a proliferation of indicators and accounts, for example in the development of non‐monetary measures of natural resources, but there are significant measurement challenges, not least the question of whether a single, overall measure or index of wellbeing is valid. But the challenge of measurement, per se, is one thing: in our view, a more critical issue is whether the measures will actually be used. We propose a dynamic and multi‐staged approach for developing SNA, embracing the production and use of measures. This would start by identifying user requirements for wider measures, to provide the basis for national and cross‐national developments in well‐being accounting. We envisage greater branding and marketing of national well‐being concepts to promote measures and support their use. We call for outreach by producers, so that there is dialogue about the development and use of measures.     

基于时间序列的辽宁省GDP预测

被美国商务部誉为"20世纪的伟大发明之一"的国内生产总值(GDP)是指一个经济社会在某一给定的时期内运用生产要素所产生的全部最终产品和劳务的市场价值。可见GDP意义之大。GDP这一经济统计数字在宏观经济中备受关注。本文基于辽宁省1978-2013的GDP数据利用时间序列的分析方法对未来五年的辽宁省GDP进行预测。     

Forecasting the Covid-19 recession and recovery: Lessons from the financial crisis

We consider simple methods to improve the growth nowcasts and forecasts obtained by mixed-frequency MIDAS and UMIDAS models with a variety of indicators during the Covid-19 crisis and recovery period, such as combining forecasts across various specifications for the same model and/or across different models, extending the model specification by adding MA terms, enhancing the estimation method by taking a similarity approach, and adjusting the forecasts to put them back on track using a specific form of intercept correction. Among these methods, adjusting the original nowcasts and forecasts by an amount similar to the nowcast and forecast errors made during the financial crisis and subsequent recovery seems to produce the best results for the US, notwithstanding the different source and characteristics of the financial crisis. In particular, the adjusted growth nowcasts for 2020Q1 get closer to the actual value, and the adjusted forecasts based on alternative indicators become much more similar, all unfortunately indicating a much slower recovery than without adjustment, and very persistent negative effects on trend growth. Similar findings also emerge for forecasts by institutions, for survey forecasts, and for the other G7 countries.     

The synchronization club: classification of global economic groups by inequality

We find that, from 1970 to 2006, the GDPs of 181 countries are described by a log-normal with a power law tail before 1992, but by a kinked power law distribution after 1992. In the 15 years from 1992 to 2006, there are two obvious scale-free zones for annual GDPs, ranked from the largest to smallest. If the countries in each scaling region are regarded as a group, the world is divided into two groups, each with a roughly stable number of members. The power exponents of the two groups are different and hence lead to different inequalities. Therefore, the basis for classification is the macro-consistent inequality within each group. The wealth grows in a synchronous nonlinear manner within groups that have a stable wealth distribution and rank structure. If each group is considered as a club, we name it a ‘synchronization club’.     

"可税与否"未改变我国GDP与税收的基本关系——基于1978～2005年数据的实证检验

文章对我国GDP构成中不可税部分加以剔除,计算出1978~2005年可税GDP。使用相关性分析和时间序列分析的方法,研究了我国1978~2005年税收和可税GDP的总量及增量之间的关系,以及税收与可税GDP增长率之间的关系。研究结果发现:税收、可税GDP的总量和增量是协整的,并且具有高度的相关性。可税GDP增长率与税收增长率的相关性微弱,并且实际GDP增长率对实际税收增长率的解释能力很低。对照剔除前的计算结果,文章发现对GDP不可税部分的剔除并没有明显改变税收与GDP在总量、增量和增长率方面的基本关系。