Dr. Michael Horrigan presented "The role of 'big' data in forecasting." Dr. Horrigan has worked at the Bureau of Labor Statistics since 1986 in a variety of positions including running the Surveys of Employer Provided Training, the National Longitudinal Surveys Program, the Occupational Employment Survey, and the BLS Occupational Projections Program.  From 2004-2007, he oversaw the BLS Producer Price Index program and from 2007-2014 he served as Associate Commissioner in the Office of Prices and Living Conditions (OPLC), which publishes consumer, producer and import/export price indexes as well as estimates of consumption expenditures.  In August 2015, Mike became the Associate Commissioner for Employment and Unemployment Programs at BLS, which includes the publication of the national civilian unemployment rate and the monthly payroll jobs numbers.  This office produces a wide variety of labor market indicators from 11 different survey programs including local area unemployment statistics, and payroll employment for counties, states, and regions, as well as detailed information on occupational employment at the national, state and MSA level of detail.

 

Dr. Krishna Rao presented "Zillow -an Industry Perspective on Forecasting in the Age of Big Data." Dr. Rao is the Director of Economic Product & Research at Zillow, where he and his team focus on building predictive models to analyze market conditions and forecast future trends and prices. Krishna is also a member of the US Census Bureau’s Scientific Advisory Committee. He joined Zillow in the summer of 2013, after finishing a Ph.D. in Economics at Stanford University focused on Macroeconomics and Finance. Prior to his Ph.D. he graduated from Columbia University with a B.A. in Economics and Math and worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York where he helped develop structural macroeconomic forecasting models to guide monetary policy.

 

Dr. Tara Sinclair presented "Where is the Big Data Revolution in Economic Forecasting?"  Dr. Sinclair is an associate professor of economics and international affairs at the George Washington University in Washington, DC.  She also served as chief economist for global job search site Indeed from September 2014-September 2016 and continues on as a senior fellow with the Hiring Lab, Indeed’s proprietary research arm focused on examining emerging employment trends. Professor Sinclair is also co-director of the George Washington University Research Program on Forecasting and serves on the governing board of the Federal Forecasters Consortium.  Her research focuses on producing and evaluating measures and forecasts of labor market and macroeconomic activity.