Households’ inflation perceptions and expectations: survey evidence from New Zealand

In this paper, we study how inflation is viewed by the general population of New Zealand. Based on unique representative survey data collected in 2016 and using descriptive statistics and multivariate regressions, we explore various aspects of how laypersons perceive inflation and form inflation expectations. We focus on how an individual’s economic situation, information search and interest in inflation, economic knowledge, and attitudes and values are related to inflation perception and expectation, as well as the individual’s reaction to them. We interpret our findings as a clear indication that laypersons’ knowledge about inflation is much better described by the imperfect information view prevailing in social psychology than by the rational actor view typically assumed in economics.

The impact of firms’ inflation perceptions on investment: Evidence from listed manufacturing enterprises in China

This article investigates the extent to which inflation perceptions affect firms’ innovation input and investment expenditure. We adopt dummy variables data to quantify the firm inflation perceptions of China’s listed manufacturing companies from corporate annual reports during the period from 2008–2018. Results reveal that inflation perceptions have a positive Tobin effect on investment spending decisions of the firms whose inflation perceive risen, vice versa. Besides, the investment expenditure of large manufacturing/ SOEs enterprises are more sensitive than small/non-SOEs firms when inflation perceptions have risen, and small/non-SOEs companies tend to reduce much more investment spending when inflation perceptions decline. Our results have significant implications for policymakers and firm managers.

Inflation perceptions and inflation expectation in South Africa: trends, determinants and comparisons (2006–2010)

This paper reports the results of a multinomial analysis of inflation perceptions and inflation expectations in South Africa. Inflation perceptions surveys among South African individuals have been undertaken since 2006. The introduction of these surveys followed on domestic inflation expectation surveys conducted in 2000, and the use of inflation perceptions surveys internationally. Domestic inflation perceptions surveys among individuals are a private initiative undertaken biennially, while domestic inflation expectation surveys among individuals are funded by the South African Reserve Bank and are undertaken quarterly. By comparing the results of domestic inflation perceptions surveys and inflation expectation surveys undertaken since 2006, this paper establishes common characteristics that impact on the formulation of inflation perceptions and inflation expectations. It supplements earlier research that focused only on the results of the 2006 and 2008 perceptions survey results. With the completion of the third biennial inflation perceptions survey in 2010, more data sets are available for the purposes of comparison. Furthermore, the questions on inflation perceptions were expanded in the third survey. Although this provides for a broader basis of analysis between inflation perceptions surveys and inflation expectation surveys, further periodic inflation perceptions survey data will be required to test whether current inflation figures determine and anchor inflation expectations.