英検1級に出そうな単語-How the IMF's economists make predictions
今回は経済のお話です。
まず
"IMF:International Monetary Fund;国際通貨基金"
リポーターの人は聞きやすいかったです。
"headquarters;本部、本社"
"outlook;見通し、見解"
"undertaking;事業、仕事、保証"
"thematic chapter;テーマによる章立て"→"thematic;主題の、論題の"
"literally;文字通りに、本当に"
"inflation;インフレ、膨張"
"gauge;基準、計測機器"
"manipulate;操作する、巧みに操る"
"make sense;意味をなす、道理に叶う"
"consistency;一貫性、矛盾がないこと"
"GDP:Gross Domestic Product;国内総生産"
"gross;全体の"
"domestic;国内の、家庭の"
"plug A in the equation;式に代入する"
→"plug A into B;AをBに入れる、当てはめる、差し込む"
"common thread;共通の要素、特徴"
"thread;糸、道筋、脈絡"
"constantly;絶えず"
"evolve;発展する、進化する"
"whereby;それによって"
"recession;不景気、後退"
"overestimate;過大評価する、買い被る"→"underestimate;過小評価する"
"downturn;下落、沈滞、不況"
"wonky;信頼できない、正常でない"
"boil down to;要約する"
"underway;進行中"
"study up on;(短い間に)検討する、調べる"
"big day;大切な日、大変な日"
"trade barriers;貿易障壁(規制)"
"geopolitical;地政学の"
"aging;老化"
"relevant;妥当な、関連する"
"highlight;強調する"
全文
00:00
We’re at the global headquarters of the International Monetary Fund in Washington, DC.
00:04
Every six months, the IMF publishes a report called the World Economic Outlook,
00:09
where it gives a forecast for the global economy.
00:11
Forecasts like these are a big undertaking. So how are they made?
00:15
We’re going to give you a behind-the- scenes look inside the process.
00:25
We are once again downgrading growth for 2019 to 3%.
00:30
So that’s Gita Gopinath, she’s the chief economist at the IMF.
00:35
We caught Gita presenting the IMF’s World Economic Outlook report to journalists from
00:39
all around the world at the fund’s annual meetings in Washington.
00:43
The World Economic Outlook is a nearly 200 page-long report that includes
00:47
hundreds of thousands of data points from 189 member countries of the IMF.
00:52
It’s released twice a year and includes economic predictions for the next two years,
00:56
along with thematic chapters that look at big-picture themes like productivity, climate change or technology.
01:02
We are really the only institution that covers literally everybody.
01:10
So how do economists even get to predictions in reports like the World Economic Outlook?
01:15
Let’s start at the beginning. First, teams collect data from countries all over world.
01:20
Government agencies measure and report stats like GDP, inflation or trade balances
01:26
this is called “hard data.” There’s also “soft data,” which includes surveys of businesses and consumers
01:32
on how they feel about the economic environment now and in the future.
01:35
The IMF’s country teams then send this data back to Washington.
01:39
I would say for each country, we’re talking one or two thousand data points.
01:44
We collect up to three or four hundred different series for most countries.
01:51
The country teams send us new sets of data approximately 1,500 times every six months.
01:59
So we’re looking at a lot of numbers. A lot of data.
02:04
It’s not just the big points they look at. GDP, for example,
02:07
helps provide a snapshot of a country’s overall economy, but individual gauges are also important.
02:12
For example, oil prices matter a lot for predictions about GDP growth in countries like Saudi Arabia or Venezuela.
02:19
That’s because their economies are largely dependent on oil.
02:22
How do you make sure this data is good data, it’s not manipulated or wrong?
02:28
We have a whole series of tests and different ways of looking at it.
02:33
Obviously we make sure the numbers actually make sense.
02:36
We do consistency checks to make sure, for example, that the components of GDP actually add up to GDP.
02:43
We look at charts to make numbers appear to be trending in the right direction.
02:48
So once all this data is collected, economists don’t just plug it into an equation to generate a prediction.
02:53
They have to consider a lot of other factors, too.
02:56
Where we really try to provide value added is pulling common threads,
03:00
trying to come up with a common story that is not like
03:04
we are just adding up countries and seeing what the global result is.
03:08
The teams here at the IMF start working on their predictions in the months
03:12
leading up to the publication of the World Economic Outlook.
03:15
And they are constantly updating their forecasts as the data evolves.
03:19
It would be nice if we had a process whereby we come to final numbers and then we write the report.
03:24
But the truth is that the report is written as the numbers evolve because we get data releases all the time.
03:32
That still doesn’t mean economists get it right.
03:34
In fact, IMF research itself has shown that economists often fail to predict recessions.
03:39
An analysis of 63 countries from 1992 to 2014 found the IMF consistently overestimated GDP growth
03:47
leading up to a recession and only revised growth downwards once the downturn was already happening.
03:52
Other papers have uncovered similar findings.
03:56
Another challenge for economists is translating predictions from wonky data into plain English.
04:02
Normally when you come out of graduate school you start with very technical language but as you
04:07
go along your career, you start realizing you really need to simplify your language
04:12
and boil it down to what it means for individual firms, families, governments.
04:21
So we are walking into a meeting where final preparations are underway
04:25
ahead of the press conference where the World Economic Outlook is released.
04:30
We got a look inside a meeting happening just days before the report was released.
04:34
Economists discussed their findings with select members of the press and
04:38
studied up on the material so that they’d be prepared to answer questions about any country in the report.
04:43
The trick is figuring out how to provide a sensible answer
04:48
to questions on places that people may not know very much about.
04:56
So today’s the big day the report is released.
04:59
These are the predictions that everyone has been waiting for and we are going to check it out.
05:08
This year’s report found global growth will slow to 3% in 2019,
05:12
that's the lowest level since the 2008-2009 financial crisis.
05:16
A lot of factors affected the IMF's forecast, but some of the biggest included more trade barriers,
05:21
geopolitical uncertainty and aging populations in advanced economies.
05:26
The data is all published online, so that many other economists around the world
05:29
can use it to make their own predictions.
05:32
How do you make sure that the predictions here in the forecast are constantly kind of up to date and relevant?
05:36
You have a lot of questions in the press conference about the news of the day.
05:39
What are you doing to be prepared?
05:41
So, these estimates actually they stay alive.
05:43
At some point we freeze it because it has to be published and put in the document, but
05:47
as of now we have these numbers constantly being updated.
05:50
Even after the findings are presented at the IMF’s press conference,
05:54
they’re highlighted throughout the next days and months by IMF officials and other world leaders.
05:59
The world economy is slowing down, we are in a synchronized slowdown.
06:06
So you might think that after this is all done, economists can take a breather for a little bit.
06:11
But it turns out, they’re already working on the economic outlook for next year.
06:14
We actually start thinking about the next one even before we publish the forecast.
06:20
Hey everyone, it's Elizabeth, thanks so much for watching our video.
06:23
What do you think about the making of the World Economic Outlook? Let us know in the comments.
06:27
And you can always leave us other ideas there too. See you later.
