Measuring real activity using a weekly economic index
构建了一个周度经济指数(WEI)，用于追踪美国新冠疫情初期及政策应对期间的快速经济变化，该指数对产出指标有强预测力，能准确预测2020年上半年GDP增长。
Summary This paper describes a weekly economic index (WEI) developed to track the rapid economic developments associated with the onset of and policy response to the novel coronavirus in the United States. The WEI is a weekly composite index of real economic activity, with eight of 10 series available the Thursday after the end of the reference week. In addition to being a weekly real activity index, the WEI has strong predictive power for output measures and provided an accurate nowcast of current‐quarter GDP growth in the first half of 2020, with weaker performance in the second half. We document how the WEI responded to key events and data releases during the first 10 months of the pandemic.