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We investigate whether smooth robust methods for forecasting can help mitigate pronounced and persistent failure across multiple forecast horizons. We demonstrate that naive predictors are interpretable as local estimators of the long-run relationship with the advantage of adapting quickly after a break, but at a cost of additional forecast error variance. Smoothing over naive estimates helps retain these advantages while reducing the costs, especially for longer forecast horizons. We derive the performance of these predictors after a location shift, and confirm the results using simulations. We apply smooth methods to forecasts of UK productivity and US 10-year Treasury yields and show that they can dramatically reduce persistent forecast failure exhibited by forecasts from macroeconomic models and professional forecasters.

Structural models' inflation forecasts are often inferior to those of naïve devices. This chapter theoretically and empirically assesses this for UK annual and quarterly inflation, using the theoretical framework in Clements and Hendry (1998, 1999). Forecasts from equilibrium-correction mechanisms, built by automatic model selection, are compared to various robust devices. Forecast-error taxonomies for aggregated and time-disaggregated information reveal that the impacts of structural breaks are identical between these, helping to interpret the empirical findings. Forecast failures in structural models are driven by their deterministic terms, confirming location shifts as a pernicious cause thereof, and explaining the success of robust devices.

Applies an error‐correction model to demand for money in five African economies: Congo, Côte d′Ivoire, Mauritius, Morocco and Tunisia. Attention is given to a set of opportunity cost variables including expected inflation, domestic interest rate, foreign interest rate and expected exchange‐rate depreciation. The empirical results show that the domestic interest rate plays a significant role in the demand for money functions for three of the five countries and external opportunity cost variables are significant for one of the others. The results show some diversity in money demand behaviour in the countries studied, but the error correction mechanism is always significant and in four out of five cases there is a short‐run inflation impact. The equations are subjected to a battery of tests and found to be statistically well‐behaved.

Recent work on the econometric specification of the consumption function by London Business School (LBS) forecasters has argued that the inclusion of a variable capturing movements in demographic structure is essential to the explanation of the recent sharp drop in the UK personal savings ratio. It is shown that the inclusion of demographic factors does not provide a model that is robust to alternative data formulations. On the contrary, an adequate explanation for recent movements in aggregate consumers′ expenditure can be found using the LBS data by specifying a consumption function that incorporates adjustment of income to control for the maintenance of the real value of asset holdings, following Hendry and Von Ungern‐Sternberg (1981).

Public external examinations were woven into the fabric of the education system of New South Wales (NSW) during the first three decades of the 20th century. By the late 1920s examination results had become the fetish and goal of most teachers and pupils in the state. In the early 1930s a reaction to this state of affairs developed; examination reform became a lively issue of debate. Central to the debate was the issue of the examination which marked the close of general adolescent education: the Intermediate Certificate (IC) examination. The agitation for IC modification began in the 1930s and did not cease until the 1960s. It began in the dissatisfaction of the 1930s, developed through the 1940s when opinion crystallized, survived the stagnation in educational reform of the late 1940s and early 1950s, quickly revived during the professional and public discussion surrounding the hearing and deliberations of the Committee Appointed to Survey Secondary Education in New South Wales (Wyndham Committee) and finally ceased with its abolition in the mid 1960s.

This chapter draws from Structuration theory (Giddens, 1979, 1984) and Schema theory (Niesser, U. (1967). Cognitive psychology. New York, NY: Appleton-Crofts.) to examine how words reflect changing frames of reference (Orlikowski & Gash, 1994) that affect adaptation to strategic technological change. The method of recursive dialogue analysis we use provides evidence of how expectations about a new technology introduced to a sales force changed over time. Individuals had expectations based on past experiences, made initial decisions about using the new technology, juxtaposed new concepts against previous ones, interacted with team-mates, and built further concepts around previously expressed phrases. The results we exhibit here allow us to visualize complex interactions under conditions of uncertainty, contributing a detailed view of the recursive and cognitive process of developing a frame of reference about technology in an organization.

In spite of escalating efforts to curb abuse, fraud, and corruption in Congress, members of Congress persist in violating the norms, rules, and laws that aim to ensure they behave ethically. This chapter combines qualitative and quantitative analysis to describe congressional corruption in the modern era. Case studies illustrate consequential financial scandals while also differentiating four categories of corrupt financial practices.

Existing datasets on congressional scandals span the time period from 1972 to 2010, and this chapter extends the dataset to 2018. The analysis next uses the dataset to answer important questions empirically. Which types of scandals occur more often? Have these scandals grown more common or less common over time? What are the consequences of financial scandals for representatives' careers as public servants?