Bertrand Pluyaud

The Breaks in Per Capita Productivity Trends in a Number of Industrial Countries

The purpose of this article is to study the trends in per capita productivity in several major industrialised countries. The analysis is first based on annual data over a long period spanning the entire 20th century for the United States, France and the United Kingdom. Productivity trends are then studied over a shorter period, using quarterly data, for the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, Japan and the Netherlands. There are already a large number of studies of this kind, but they are too often focused on presenting average productivity growth rates for given periods chosen on an ad hoc basis. In this article, we use a robust statistical method to endogenously identify possible breaks in per capita productivity trends. This method, developed by Bai and Perron (1998), brings out the following salient features: – in the United States, per capita productivity growth accelerated following the trend break at the start of the 1920s, then slowed down at the end of the 1960s. This finding is in line with the “Big Wave” concept developed by Gordon (1999, 2002) to describe the trends in US productivity growth throughout the 20 th century. – French and UK productivity started catching up with that in the United States around the end of the Second World War. – Most of the countries under review recorded slower trend productivity growth in the first half of the 1970s. In the United States, this break occurred in 1966. This finding differs from that of other existing analyses, which point to 1974. – Trend productivity growth in Europe and Japan slowed in the 1990s, whereas US productivity gained momentum over the same period.

Monthly Forecasting of French GDP: A Revised Version of the Optim Model

This paper presents a revised version of the model OPTIM, proposed by Irac and Sedillot (2002), used at the Banque de France in order to predict French GDP quarterly growth rate, for the current and next quarters. The model is designed to be used on a monthly basis by integrating monthly economic information through bridge models, for both supply and demand sides of GDP. For each GDP component, bridge equations are specified by using a general-to-specific approach implemented in an automated way by Hoover and Perez (1999) and improved by Krolzig and Hendry (2001). This approach allows to select explanatory variables among a large data set of hard and soft data. The final choice of equations relies on a recursive forecast study, which also helps to assess the forecasting performance of the revised OPTIM model in the prediction of aggregated GDP. This study is based on pseudo real-time forecasts taking publication lags into account. It turns out that the model outperforms benchmark models.

Monthly GDP Forecasting Using Bridge Models: Application for the French Economy

This paper presents a model to predict French gross domestic product (GDP) quarterly growth rate. The model is designed to be used on a monthly basis by integrating monthly economic information through bridge models, for both supply and demand sides, allowing thus economic interpretations. For each GDP component, bridge equations are specified by using a general‐to‐specific approach implemented in an automated way by Hoover and Perez and improved by Krolzig and Hendry. This approach allows to select explanatory variables among a large data set of hard and soft data. A rolling forecast study is carried out to assess the forecasting performance in the prediction of aggregated GDP, by taking publication lags into account in order to run pseudo real‐time forecasts. It turns out that the model outperforms benchmark models. The results show that changing the set of equations over the quarter is superior to keeping the same equations over time. In addition, GDP growth seems to be more precisely predicted from a supply‐side approach rather than a demand‐side approach.

Market Shares and Trade Specialisation of France, Germany and Italy

The trade performances of France, Germany and Italy in the 1990s and 2000s have followed heterogeneous national patterns. Contrary to the Italian situation, French and German divergences cannot be explained by relative cost and price developments; geographical specialisation has a limited role in the differences between the three countries. Sectoral specialisation sheds some light to these divergences, emphasising the exposure of Italy to emerging country competition and the limited specialisation of France, while all three countries share a lack of specialisation in ICT products. Non-price competitiveness indicators, such as R&D or education levels, could also contribute to explain the German strength and Italian weakness.

New Estimate of the MIBA Forecasting Model. Modeling First-Release GDP Using the Banque De France's Monthly Business Survey and the 'Blocking' Approach

This paper introduces the new Monthly Index of Business Activity (MIBA) model of the Banque de France for forecasting Frances GDP. As the previous versions, the model relies exclusively on data from the monthly business survey (EMC) conducted by the Banque de France. However, several major changes have been implemented in the present version, such as the shift from a model based on factors to a model based on survey opinions, the explicit targeting of first-release GDP, and the use of the “blocking” approach to deal with mixed frequencies and missing observations. The selected monthly equations are consistent with the time frame of real-time forecasting exercises: the first month equation is dominated by data on expected evolution of the economic activity across the coincident quarter, while for the second and third month equations data on observed economic activity become more important and forward-looking information is progressively discarded. Finally, out-of-sample results suggest that the new MIBA model broadly outperforms several competing models, such as the previous version of MIBA and models based on alternative specifications.

Modelling Imports and Exports of Goods in France, Distinguishing Between Intra and Extra Euro Area Trade

This paper presents equations for intra and extra euro area trade for France. Volumes and prices of imports and exports of goods are modelled. Dynamic simulations, residual tests and rolling forecasts indicate that the equations have satisfactory forecasting properties. However, trends and dummy variables are often added and competitiveness effects are not always well captured, probably due to inadequate data. Among other results, we find a stronger long run elasticity to price competitiveness for intra than for extra euro area exports, and positive contributions of price competitiveness to non energy import growth since 1999, probably due to evolutions in costs rather than in exchange rates.