Evaluating Threshold Effects in Consumer Sentiment

This paper assesses the usefulness of consumer sentiment in forecasting aggregate consumer spending in the United States. The literature tends to dismiss the relevance of these sentiment indexes. Without formal modeling, however, some researchers suggest that consumer sentiment could be helpful during periods of major economic or political shocks. Such periods are usually associated with high volatility of consumer sentiment, suggesting that large swings in sentiment could be useful indicators of consumption. Our work distinguishes itself from previous research in that we provide a rigorous assessment of this possibility by estimating a consumption function in which only large variations of sentiment can affect spending. Our results show that economists and forecasters should pay attention to consumer sentiment, especially in times of elevated economic or political uncertainty.