Does Benford's law hold in economic resear and forecasting? /

First and higher order digits in data sets of natural and socio-economic processes often follow a distribution called Benford’s law. This phenomenon has been used in business and scientific applications, especially in fraud detection for financial data. In this paper, we analyse whether Benford’s la...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Günnel, Stefan
Other Authors: Tödter, Karl-Heinz
Format: Book
Language:English
Published: Frankfurt am Main : Deutsche Bundesbank, 2007
Series:Discussion paper (Deutsche Bundesbank). Series 1: economic studies no. 32/2007
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.bundesbank.de/Redaktion/EN/Downloads/Publications/Discussion_Paper_1/2007/2007_12_10_dkp_32.pdf?__blob=publicationFile
Description
Summary:First and higher order digits in data sets of natural and socio-economic processes often follow a distribution called Benford’s law. This phenomenon has been used in business and scientific applications, especially in fraud detection for financial data. In this paper, we analyse whether Benford’s law holds in economic research and forecasting. First, we examine the distribution of regression coefficients and standard errors in research papers, published in Empirica and Applied Economics Letters. Second, we analyse forecasts of GDP growth and CPI inflation in Germany, published in Consensus Forecasts. There are two main findings: The relative frequencies of the first and second digits in economic research are broadly consistent with Benford’s law. In sharp contrast, the second digits of Consensus Forecasts exhibit a massive excess of zeros and fives, raising doubts on their information content.
Physical Description:41 p.
Bibliography:Bibliografía: p. 25-27.
ISBN:9783865583598