Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock (
) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.
Topics
Data & Maps
Surveys & Programs
Resource Library
The Timing and Magnitude Relationships Between Month-to-Month Changes and Year-to-Year Changes That Make Comparing Them Difficult
The Timing and Magnitude Relationships Between Month-to-Month Changes and Year-to-Year Changes That Make Comparing Them Difficult
Abstract
When a monthly economic indicator series contracts sharply for a few months and then starts to recover, the published annual and monthly growth rates can give conflicting signals: the annual growth rate can indicate a decrease and the monthly growth rate an increase or vice versa. This is well known to the seasonal adjustment community, see, for example, Shiskin (1957). In this paper, we revisit, illustrate and then explain this potential for conflict more analytically. For example, the annual differences lag the monthly differences by five and a half months because the same-month-year-ago difference is the sum of the current and eleven preceding monthly differences, and the annual sum has a phase shift of five and a half months. Illustrative examples are followed by an elementary formal mathematical derivation using the gain and phase functions of the annual sums.
Others in Series
Working Paper
Seasonal Adjustment to Facilitate Forecasting: Empirical Results
In this paper we consider how well seasonal adjustment methods, and certain of their variations, satisfy one objective of seasonal adjustment.
Working Paper
Fixed-B Asymptotics for the Studentized Mean from Time Series
This paper considers the problem of variance estimation for the sample mean in the context of long memory and negative memory time series dynamics.
Working Paper
X-13ARIMA-SEATS and iMetrica
This paper will give the latest developments in two ongoing software projects.
Related Information
Page Last Revised - October 8, 2021
✕
Is this page helpful?
Yes
No
Yes
No✕
NO THANKS
255 characters maximum
255 characters maximum reached
255 characters maximum reached
✕
Thank you for your feedback.
Comments or suggestions?
Comments or suggestions?
