Tag: Forecast

The Blip: American Economic History on a timeline [Article]

I grew up to the adage that when America sneezes, the world catches a cold. What happens in America does have an impact on the rest of the globe’s denizens. Which is why I read this article with interest.  Benjamin Wallace-Wells deciphers economist Dr. Robert Gordon’s two predictions for the American economy:

Perhaps it isn’t that our success is a product of the way we structured our society. The shape of our society may be far more conditional, a consequence of our success. Embedded in Gordon’s data is an inquiry into entitlement: How much do we owe, culturally and politically, to this singular experience of economic growth, and what will happen if it goes away?

Forecasting

It’s budgeting time where I work, & I found this quote pertinent: “You might call this species of cocked-up forecasting the tyranny of significant digits; more broadly, it is the cardinal mistake of dressing up uncertainty—an incalculable unknown—with risk, a highly calculable gamble with discrete odds. Risk is gambling on a flush in poker, knowing the odds are one in four of drawing the suit that you need; uncertainty is playing poker without a clear idea of the rules or the distribution of cards in the deck.” from Nate Silver’s book The Signal and the Noise. (emphasis mine)