Expectations Surveys, Central Banks and the Economy

Building on the success of the previous editions, the Bank of Canada (BoC), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York (NY FRB) are organising the fifth joint conference on expectations surveys on 1 and 2 October at the ECB in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. The aim of the conference is to bring together scholars to present their current research involving expectations surveys.

Over the past decade, central banks and other policy making institutions have increasingly drawn on survey data on expectations for their economic policy analysis and research. These data cover consumers, firms, market experts and professional forecasters and they can provide insights into how economic agents form and update their expectations, the heterogeneity and biases in these expectations, and how these expectations feed into economic decisions that can have wide implications for the economy and for monetary policy. The conference program will feature two plenary keynote sessions from academic experts and a policy panel discussion on the main insights for central banks from research and experiences with expectations surveys.

The scientific committee is delighted to announce that Annamaria Lusardi, Stanford University, and Tarun Ramadorai, Imperial College London, have confirmed their participation as keynote speakers. 

We invite authors to submit completed papers via Conference Maker by 30 June 2024. Successful applicants will be notified at the latest by 2 August 2024.

Contributions in the following areas are of particular interest:

• Factors influencing expectations’ formation and updating of expectations
• The effect of monetary, fiscal and other economic policy interventions on economic expectations and decisions
• How expectations shape behaviour and economic choices
• Implications of expectations formation processes for effective policy design and communication
• The anchoring of inflation expectations and dynamics of expectations in different inflation regimes
• Implications of expectations for price and wage setting behaviour
• Methodological issues related to expectations data and surveys
• The use of expectations in econometric and structural models

The conference will be in person with a hybrid option. In-person attendance of presenters is envisaged. Remote participation will be available for other attendees.

The organisers will cover reasonable travel expenses and two nights of accommodation for one presenter per selected paper – subject to the relevant institutional rules and guidelines. Presenters are requested to stay for the entire conference. Please note that attendance is by invitation only.

Scientific Committee:

• Olivier Armantier, NY Fed
• Maarten Dossche, ECB
• Dimitris Georgarakos, ECB
• Yuriy Gorodnichenko, UC Berkeley
• Monica Jain, BoC
• Geoff Kenny, ECB
• Gizem Kosar, NY Fed
• Olena Kostyshyna, BoC
• Patrick Sabourin, BoC
• Jason Somerville, NY Fed
• Wilbert van der Klaauw, NY Fed
• Tao Wang, BoC