1) One of the most important tasks of the professional economist, whether in government or private sector employment, is to be able to forecast future economic phenomena. Many economic variables are heavily dependent upon the state of the economy. For example, forecasts of economic growth are widely used by economists for all sorts of reasons related to economic policy and business well-being. The longer the time period the forecast covers, the greater the uncertainty involved. When the Bank of England, for instance, makes forecasts of inflation it produces fan charts to reflect this greater uncertainty. Types of forecasts 2) Economists use various types of forecasting methods. The three main types are: - statistical forecasts based on simple or sophisticated future extrapolation techniques - using models to produce a range of forecasts - this is particularly true of models of the economy involving complex interrelationships - forecasts based on intuition, experience or even guesswork, i.e., not involving statistical methods.
The word “phenomena” in Paragraph (1) is closest in meaning to