economic indicator

(noun)

An economic indicator (or business indicator) is a statistic about the economy. Economic indicators allow analysis of economic performance and predictions of future performance.

Related Terms

Examples of economic indicator in the following topics:

  • Economic Indicators

    • An economic indicator is a statistic that provides valuable information about the economy.
    • One application of economic indicators is the study of business cycles.
    • There is no shortage of economic indicators, and trying to follow them all would be an overwhelming task.
    • Other producers of economic indicators includes the United States Census Bureau and United States Bureau of Economic Analysis.
    • Identify the major economic indicators and what economic factors they measure

  • Defining Macroeconomics

    • Macroeconomics is a branch of economics that focuses on the behavior and decision-making of an economy as a whole.
    • Economics is comprised of many specializations; however, the two broad sub-groupings for economics are microeconomics and macroeconomics.
    • Macroeconomists study aggregated indicators such as GDP, unemployment rates, and price indices to understand how the whole economy functions and develop models that explain the relationship between such factors as national income, output, consumption, unemployment, inflation, savings, investment, government spending, and international trade.
    • These variables taken as a whole comprise a grouping of variables that are referred to as economic indicators.
    • As a result, macroeconomics tends to be widely cited in discussions related to government intervention in economic expansion and contraction, as well as, with respect to the evaluation of economic policy.

  • Recessions

    • A recession is a business cycle contraction; a general slowdown in economic activity.
    • In economics, a recession is a business cycle contraction; a general slowdown in economic activity.
    • Macroeconomic indicators such as GDP (Gross Domestic Product), employment, investment spending, capacity utilization, household income, business profits, and inflation fall, while bankruptcies and the unemployment rate rise.
    • A recession has many attributes that can occur simultaneously, these include declines in component measures (economic indicators) of economic activity (GDP) such as consumption, investment, government spending, and net export activity.
    • These indicators in turn, reflect underlying drivers such as employment levels and skills, household savings rates, corporate investment decisions, interest rates, demographics, and government policies.

  • Economic Growth as a Measuring Stick

    • Economic growth is measured as the increase in real gross domestic product (GDP) in the long-run, through higher resources or productivity.
    • If inflation is calculated to be 3% between 1900 and 1901, real economic growth will equate to 2%.
    • An outline of the perspectives of economic growth over time include:
    • As a result, energy growth theory economists identify a critical role of energy and resources in measuring overall economic growth.
    • This outward shift in the Production-Possibility frontier is indicative of economic growth within the economy it represents.

  • Disinvestment and Deindustrialization

    • First, a straightforward decline in the output of manufactured goods or in employment in the manufacturing sector may indicate deindustrialization.
    • However, not every simple decline in output or employment of the manufacturing sector necessarily indicates deindustrialization; short-run downturns may be part of the economic cycle and should not be mistaken for long-term deindustrialization.
    • Second, deindustrialization may be indicated by a shift from manufacturing to the service sector— economic sectors that focus on serving others rather than producing some physical object.
    • One explanation centers on economic progress.
    • The decline in employment in manufacturing sectors that comes about from this progress can indicate deindustrialization.

  • Comparing the Fields of Finance, Economics, and Accounting

    • Economics is fundamentally the study of cause and effect.
    • This indicates how financially healthy a company is.
    • Finance, economics, and accounting overlap in a lot of areas.
    • Part of that prediction incorporates economics.
    • There are few strong delineators between finance, economics and accounting.

  • What is Economics?

    • Economics has been defined here as both a study of the provisioning problem and the allocation problem.
    • An economic system must also be able to allocate resources or inputs to their highest valued uses.
    • To evaluate the success or failure of an economic system, it is necessary to express values.
    • In spite of the warnings of Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) an Irish playwright who commented "A cynic is someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing," market prices are often used as indicators of value.
    • The study of economics as provisioning must include the value of non-market as well as market phenomena.

  • Entrepreneurship and the Economy

    • The accumulation of factors of production per se does not explain economic development.
    • Early economic theory, however did not pay proper attention to the entrepreneur.
    • The article was a prod to the economics profession to attend to this neglected factor.
    • If entrepreneurship remains as important to the economy as ever, then the continuing failure of mainstream economics to adequately account for entrepreneurship indicates that fundamental principles require re-evaluation.
    • The supposition that entrepreneurship leads to economic growth is an interpretation of the residual in endogenous growth theory and as such is hotly debated in academic economics.

  • Calculating Economic Growth

    • In economics, economic growth refers to the growth of potential output.
    • The cognitive skills of a population directly impact economic growth.
    • The short-run variation in economic growth is called the business cycle.
    • Economists use it to distinguish between short-run variations in economic growth and long-run economic growth.
    • For economic purposes, the economic growth is calculated and compared to the population, also know as per capita income (indicator of a country's standard of living).

  • Defining and Measuring Income Inequality

    • Models, ratios and indices include:
    • 20:20 Ratio:This name indicates the method; the top 20% and the bottom 20% of earners are used to derive a ratio.
    • In this case, 0 indicates perfect equality, and 1 indicates perfect inequality.
    • Some powerful economies, like the United States and China, demonstrate high inequality despite high economic power while others, like Switzerland or Norway, demonstrate high equality despite lower economic output.
    • This is a critical consideration in economic policy (from a political perspective).