Bundesbank mocks US IT book-cooking

[Brad De Long]

>Michael Pollak wrote:
>
>>[Here's the guess a letter writer to the FT came up with: a US real GDP
>>growth rate 1/3 less than that posted for the last two years]
>
>Dunno how Riechebacher - who, I might add, has been predicting 
>disaster for the better part of 20 years, maybe longer - came up 
>with this. Real GDP growth with computers was 5.7% from 99Q2 to 
>00Q2; it's 5.2% without. With the chained method, components of GDP 
>don't add up to total GDP, so you can't just subtract out computer 
>sales.
>
>Doug

A point that's going to become more and more important. Should we 
(_JEP_, that is) publish a primer on not making a fool of yourself 
with chain-weighted data?

Brad DeLong