Weekly Economic Index (WEI)

August 27, 2020

 

Daniel Lewis, New York Fed

Karel Mertens, Dallas Fed

James Stock, Harvard University

The WEI is an index of 10 weekly indicators of real economic activity, scaled to have the units of four-quarter percent change of real GDP.

• The WEI is currently -4.91 percent, scaled to four-quarter GDP growth, for the week ended August 22 and -6.16 percent for August 15; for reference, the WEI stood at 1.55 percent for the week ended February 29.
• The increase in the WEI for the week of August 22 was due to a decline in initial unemployment insurance claims and increases in fuel sales, rail traffic, and tax withholding, which more than offset a decline in electricity output. The WEI for the week of August 15 was revised downward due to the continuing unemployment insurance claims release, which while lower than the prior week, still provided a more negative signal than previously available data.
• As alternative scales, the current WEI implies a 19.53 percent decrease in IP (YoY) and a 711k employee decrease in nonfarm payroll.
• Data dashboard and .release (.pdf)
• Historical data including recent release (.xlsx)

 

Weekly Economic Index (WEI)

August 20, 2020

 

Daniel Lewis, New York Fed

Karel Mertens, Dallas Fed

James Stock, Harvard University

The WEI is an index of 10 weekly indicators of real economic activity, scaled to have the units of four-quarter percent change of real GDP.

 

• The WEI is currently -5.73 percent, scaled to four-quarter GDP growth, for the week ended August 15 and -6.07 percent for August 08; for reference, the WEI stood at 1.55 percent for the week ended February 29.
• The increase in the WEI for the week of August 15 (relative to the final estimate for August 8) was due to an increase in electricity output, which offset an increase in unemployment insurance initial claims and declines in fuel sales, tax withholding, and rail traffic (relative to the same time last year). The WEI for the week of August 8 was revised downward due to the continuing unemployment insurance claims release, which while lower than the prior week, still provided a more negative signal than previously available data.
• As alternative scales, the current WEI implies a 21.99 percent decrease in IP (YoY) and a 811k employee decrease in nonfarm payroll.
• Data dashboard and .release (.pdf)
• Historical data including recent release (.xlsx)

 

 

Professional Forecasters' Outlook - August Update

 
On May 14 I posted a plot of the distribution of forecasts from the Wall Street Journal's monthly survey of economists. Here is the history of these plots, for surveys from May, June, July, and August, in reverse chronological order. 

The survey comes out around the 12th of the month. Changes in the outlook represent becoming more optimistic, as they were in June and July, or less, as they are in August. The August forecasts are about back to the gloomy outlook in May. 

The spread of the distribution of forecasts has tightened since May. However, the spread of the forecast doesn't capture uncertainty - it is just the dispersion of the point forecasts, not a representation of the composite uncertainty about the economists' forecasts.

 

 

Weekly Economic Index (WEI)

August 13, 2020

 

Daniel Lewis, New York Fed

Karel Mertens, Dallas Fed

James Stock, Harvard University

The WEI is an index of 10 weekly indicators of real economic activity, scaled to have the units of four-quarter percent change of real GDP.

 

• The WEI is currently -5.47 percent, scaled to four-quarter GDP growth, for the week ended August 8 and -6.53 percent for August 1; for reference, the WEI stood at 1.55 percent for the week ended February 29.
• The increase in the WEI for the week of August 8 was due to a decline in initial unemployment insurance claims and increases in rail traffic and fuel sales, which more than offset decreases in electricity output and tax withholding. The WEI for the week of August 1 was revised downward due to the continuing unemployment insurance claims release, which while lower than the prior week, still provided a more negative signal than previously available data.
• As alternative scales, the current WEI implies a 21.22 percent decrease in IP (YoY) and a 779k employee decrease in nonfarm payroll.
• Data dashboard and .release (.pdf)
• Historical data including recent release (.xlsx)

 

Weekly Economic Index (WEI)

August 6, 2020

 

Daniel Lewis, New York Fed

Karel Mertens, Dallas Fed

James Stock, Harvard University

The WEI is an index of 10 weekly indicators of real economic activity, scaled to have the units of four-quarter percent change of real GDP.

• The WEI is currently -6.20 percent, scaled to four-quarter GDP growth, for the week ended August 01 and -7.01 percent for July 25; for reference, the WEI stood at 1.55 percent for the week ended February 29
• Today’s increase in the WEI for the week of August 1 was driven by a decline in initial UI claims (the first value below 1 million since the week of March 14, 2020, in non-seasonally adjusted terms) and increases in rail traffic and tax withholding, which more than offset decreases in fuel sales and electricity output. The WEI for the week of July 25 was revised downward due to the continuing UI claims release, which while lower than the prior week, still provided a more negative signal than previously available data.
• As alternative scales, the current WEI implies a 23.44 percent decrease in IP (YoY) and a 869k employee decrease in nonfarm payroll.
• Data dashboard and .release (.pdf)
• Historical data including recent release (.xlsx)