MEASURING MACROECONOMIC INSTABILITY: A CRITICAL SURVEY ILLUSTRATED WITH EXPORTS SERIES
批判性综述了宏观经济不稳定性的衡量指标，利用134个国家1970-2005年的出口收入数据，发现基于方差的指标高度相关，但不同趋势计算方法下，衡量不对称性和极端偏差的指标可能存在巨大差异，呼吁关注不稳定性的不同维度。
Abstract For at least 40 years, the analysis of the causes and consequences of macroeconomic instability has greatly deepened our understanding of the handicaps faced by developing countries. This concern on economic instability is evidenced by a broad spectrum of indicators, based on the deviation of observed values of a given economic aggregate from its reference or trend value. In general, the choice of this or that indicator is not discussed advocating that the resulting instability indicators are closely correlated. Focusing on measurements of instability in export revenue data for 134 countries from 1970 to 2005, this paper finds that this assertion may be true for variance‐based indicators, measuring the average magnitude of deviations from the trend. However, great discrepancies may arise between different measures of the asymmetry or of the occurrence of extreme deviations around the trend when different trend computation methods are used. Our purpose is, therefore, to invite further discussions regarding the use of these indicators, and to highlight the different dimensions of instability, which have been so far unheeded by the economic literature.