Do survey joiners and leavers differ from regular participants?

Abstract/Summary

If learning-by-doing is important for macro-forecasting, newcomers might be different to regular, established particants. Stayers may also differ from the soon-to-leave. We test these conjectures for macro-forecasters' point predictions of output growth and inflation, and for their histogram forecasts. Histogram forecasts of inflation by both joiners and leavers are found to be less accurate, especially if we suppose that joiners take time to learn. For GDP growth, there is no evidence for differences between the groups in terms of histogram forecast accuracy, although leavers GDP point forecasts are less accurate. These findings are predicated on forecasters being homogeneous within groups. Allowing for individual fixed effects suggests fewer differences, including leavers' inflation histogram forecasts being no less accurate.