Google: Central Banks' New Economic Indicator

Cita: 

Ito, Aki y Alisa Odenheimer [2012], “Google: Central Banks' New Economic Indicator”, Business Week, New York, 9 de agosto, http://www.bloomberg.com/bw/articles/2012-08-09/google-central-banks-new...

Fuente: 
Business Week
Fecha de publicación: 
Jueves, Agosto 9, 2012
Idea principal: 

Israel's central bank, Bank of Israel, is at the forefront of the hunt for new economic indicators. It analyzes keyword counts on Google for everything from aerobics classes to refrigerators to gauge consumer demand before releasing government statistics. The Federal Reserve and the central banks of Britain, Italy, Spain, Turkey, and Chile have followed Israel's lead with their own studies to see if search volumes on Google correlate with broader economic trends. One challenge for policymakers is setting rates based on data often gathered weeks before. Google makes its updated data available one to three days after searches. Even the biggest proponents of Google-as-indicator cite the need to proceed cautiously. By limiting its sample to Internet users, the search volumes may not reflect purchases by those who tend to live more offline: the elderly and the poor.