Publication: Nowcasting Economic Activity in Times of COVID-19: An Approximation from the Google Community Mobility Report
Date
2020-05
ISSN
Published
2020-05
Author(s)
Sampi, James
Jooste, Charl
Abstract
This paper proposes a leading indicator,
the "Google Mobility Index," for nowcasting
monthly industrial production growth rates in selected
economies in Latin America and the Caribbean. The index is
constructed using the Google COVID-19 Community Mobility
Report database via a Kalman filter. The Google database is
publicly available starting from February 15, 2020. The
paper uses a backcasting methodology to increase the
historical number of observations and then augments a lag of
one week in the mobility data with other high-frequency data
(air quality) over January 1, 2019 to April 30, 2020.
Finally, mixed data sampling regression is implemented for
nowcasting industrial production growth rates. The Google
Mobility Index is a good predictor of industrial production.
The results suggest a significant decline in output of
between 5 and 7 percent for March and April, respectively,
while indicating a trough in output in mid-April.
Citation
“Sampi, James; Jooste, Charl. 2020. Nowcasting Economic Activity in Times of COVID-19; Nowcasting Economic Activity in Times of COVID-19: An Approximation from the Google Community Mobility Report : An Approximation from the Google Community Mobility Report. Policy Research Working Paper;No. 9247. © World Bank, Washington, DC. http://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/33794 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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