Related BLS programs | Related articles
December 2006, Vol. 129, No. 12
Item replacement and quality change in apparel price indexes
Craig Brown
Economist, Office of Prices and Living Conditions, Bureau of Labor Statistics.
E-mail:
brown.craig@bls.gov
Anya Stockburger
Economist, Office of Prices and Living Conditions, Bureau of Labor Statistics.
E-mail: stockburger.anya@bls.gov
The role of commodity analysts in producing price indexes for the apparel component of the U.S. Consumer Price Index (CPI) is examined. Analyst intervention is decomposed into two stages relating to the review of microlevel data: item replacements and quality change. Five experimental price indexes are calculated to simulate the impact of removing analyst intervention. The resulting indexes are compared with official apparel price indexes to measure the effects of analyst intervention. Estimates indicate that experimental apparel price indexes produced without analyst intervention would tend to rise more or fall less than their official counterparts.
Read excerpt
Download full article in PDF
(152K)
Related Monthly Labor Review articles
Within Monthly Labor Review Online:
Welcome | Current Issue | Index | Subscribe | Archives
Exit Monthly Labor Review Online:
BLS Home | Publications & Research Papers