Everybody Loves FRED (nytimes.com) 56
An anonymous reader shares a report: Fans post about him on social media. Swag bearing his name sells out on the regular. College professors dedicate class sessions and textbook sections to him. Foreign government officials have been known to express jealousy over his skills, and one prominent economist refers to him as a "national treasure." Meet FRED, a 33-year-old data tool from St. Louis, Mo., and the economics world's most unlikely celebrity.
Even if you have not interacted with FRED yourself, there is a good chance you've encountered him without knowing it. The tool's signature baby blue graphs dot social media and crop up on many of the world's most popular news websites. Many people feel that way about FRED. The website had nearly 15 million users last year, and it is on track for even more in 2024, up from fewer than 400,000 as recently as 2009. Their reasons for clicking are diverse: FRED users are coming for freshly released unemployment data, to check in on egg inflation or to find out whether business is booming in Memphis.
That appeal crosses political lines. Larry Kudlow, who directed the National Economic Council during the first Trump administration, has tweeted and retweeted FRED charts. Groups as disparate as the spending-focused Alaskans for a Sustainable Budget and the pro-worker advocacy organization Employ America have used its charts to back up their arguments. It is even occasionally used by professional and White House economists, who tend to have access to sophisticated data tools, for quick charts. "It is unfathomable for me now, to think of the days before FRED," said Ernie Tedeschi, the director of economics at the Budget Lab at Yale and a former chief economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers.
When he speaks to foreign government economists, he noted, they are often "jealous" of the data tool, which is more comprehensive and easier to use than what other countries offer. "It's a compliment to FRED," he said. FRED -- whose name stands for Federal Reserve Economic Data -- was born in 1991. But he was a sparkle in the eye of the St. Louis Fed long before that. The story started in the 1960s, with an economist named Homer Jones (now sometimes referred to as the "grandfather of FRED"). Mr. Jones was the director of research at the Fed's branch in St. Louis, and he wanted to make central bank decisions more data-based, so he started to mail typed data reports to Fed officials around the country.
Even if you have not interacted with FRED yourself, there is a good chance you've encountered him without knowing it. The tool's signature baby blue graphs dot social media and crop up on many of the world's most popular news websites. Many people feel that way about FRED. The website had nearly 15 million users last year, and it is on track for even more in 2024, up from fewer than 400,000 as recently as 2009. Their reasons for clicking are diverse: FRED users are coming for freshly released unemployment data, to check in on egg inflation or to find out whether business is booming in Memphis.
That appeal crosses political lines. Larry Kudlow, who directed the National Economic Council during the first Trump administration, has tweeted and retweeted FRED charts. Groups as disparate as the spending-focused Alaskans for a Sustainable Budget and the pro-worker advocacy organization Employ America have used its charts to back up their arguments. It is even occasionally used by professional and White House economists, who tend to have access to sophisticated data tools, for quick charts. "It is unfathomable for me now, to think of the days before FRED," said Ernie Tedeschi, the director of economics at the Budget Lab at Yale and a former chief economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers.
When he speaks to foreign government economists, he noted, they are often "jealous" of the data tool, which is more comprehensive and easier to use than what other countries offer. "It's a compliment to FRED," he said. FRED -- whose name stands for Federal Reserve Economic Data -- was born in 1991. But he was a sparkle in the eye of the St. Louis Fed long before that. The story started in the 1960s, with an economist named Homer Jones (now sometimes referred to as the "grandfather of FRED"). Mr. Jones was the director of research at the Fed's branch in St. Louis, and he wanted to make central bank decisions more data-based, so he started to mail typed data reports to Fed officials around the country.
Why is this here? (Score:2, Funny)
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I might be interested in an article about what FRED is and how it works.Maybe it's in the actual NYT article, but that's paywalled. The summary merely tells us how wonderful it is.
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... or you could just go to the FRED website and read through their tutorials... if that's not too much work.
Lazy to expect the NYT to give you a tutorial.
Re: Why is this here? (Score:1)
No one expects a tutorial. We expect a summary that would explain what's going on.
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RTFA
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I might be interested in an article about what FRED is and how it works.
Near the end of TFS it says, " FRED -- whose name stands for Federal Reserve Economic Data" so one might guess it's about economic data at the Federal Reserve ... the rest of TFS mentions charts, graphs and data, so one might guess the site has a bunch of those. ;-)
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Why did you propagate the vacuous Subject and why was the vacuous FP modded Funny?
And why do I care? This is Slashdot.
Ask a railroad worker about FRED (Score:2, Offtopic)
You will have a different discussion :D
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I didn't figure railroad workers as the demographic who watched old Lucas Cruikshank YouTube videos. Either that or there's just too many damn FREDs and we probably should try to be more specific.
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SP still ran them when I was a kid, and I remember the first time I saw FRED instead. I was curious, but disappointed.
Re:Ask a railroad worker about FRED (Score:4, Funny)
You will have a different discussion :D
Flashing Rear End Device (FRED) [wikipedia.org] Of course I had to look it up!
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Oh, I always knew them as TED - Tail-End Device. I think they're also known as EOT device (end-of-train device), also abbreviated as ETD.
I must then not be in "everybody"... (Score:4, Insightful)
Because a) I did not know about this thing b) I tend not to "love" things and c) now that I know, I find I do not care.
Bullshit headline is bullshit.
Re: I must then not be in "everybody"... (Score:1)
No, everybody does NOT like FRED (Score:4, Funny)
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Federal Reserve Economic Database.
It's the data the Fed uses when trying to create economic policy.
Re: No, everybody does NOT like FRED (Score:1)
Re:No, everybody does NOT like FRED (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure I still wouldn't like it.
You don't like data driven economic policy? Oh man you're going to LOVE the next 4 years.
Fred? (Score:1)
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FRED is the mission editor for Descent: FreeSpace
"Everybody loves" (Score:2, Informative)
A Fatal Conceit (Score:3)
In a chaotic, non-linear, non-deterministic system, more data does not lead to better outcomes. Friedrich Hayek is our prophet.
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So how is your preferred system working for you and others?
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Happy for you. Especially since the incoming President is the opposite of a free-market Hayek.
"Once you've built the big machinery of political power, remember you won't always be the one to run it." -- P. J. O'Rourke
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The problem is, only half of Keynesian economics is being done. The spending part, when needed, is the easy part. It's the paying down the debt once times are better which is the hard part. If that part would be done, things would even be better.
However, so long as the Fed and Treasury keep propping up private industry rather than letting the markets work as they should, we'll ne
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Keynesian economics has the same problem that communism has... it works great in theory... but in practice - not so much.
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The economy is growing, the overall debt-to-GDP ratio is not rising.
WHAT? (Score:2)
Yippeee? News for um..
Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) (Score:5, Informative)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/se... [stlouisfed.org]
For those who did not read till the end.
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Re: Federal Reserve Economic Data (FRED) (Score:2)
It could also be the case that smaller companies only have to report per quarter, although most reporting should be monthly.
Amazed at all the negativity here (Score:5, Insightful)
I am really shocked at all the negative comments, and lack of familiarity with the tool. Its been an internet fixture for data geeks for as long as it has existed.
As much time as economics jawboning that goes on around here, you'd think people posting would have interested in actual data and would be happy that they have access to a non-bullshit platform to look at federal reserve data directly.
I guess everyone prefers to wait for their favorite bias media sources to cherry pick the statistics for them and tell them what to think...
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I am actually not a fan of the FED, in general but I am glad I can at least see the data they are using to make decisions.
I think if you took the time to think about how the framers intended checks and balances to work and the consequences direct election of senators has had instead of you 'derp democracy good derp derp' reaction you'd see a lot of the dysfunction and frankly anti-democratic behavior that goes on today has a lot to do with our 'administrative districts' not having any voice of their own in
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DarkOx lied:
I think if you took the time to think about how the framers intended checks and balances to work and the consequences direct election of senators has had instead of you 'derp democracy good derp derp' reaction you'd see a lot of the dysfunction and frankly anti-democratic behavior that goes on today has a lot to do with our 'administrative districts' not having any voice of their own in the federal government.
Except that, due to generations of gerrymandering at the state level, very close to 2/3 of state legislatures are firmly in the claws of the Republican party, which would guarantee permanent GOP control of the Senate, with a large enough majority to allow the them to amend the Constitution at whim.
What was that about "frankly anti-democratic behavior" again ... ?
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How Can I Navigate to the Originating Source of the Data? [stlouisfed.org]: "Below a graph, go to the “NOTES” section. Next to “Source” (on the first line), click the source name (see the red box below) to go to the source’s homepage." (Not really very useful.)
How to Find More Information About the Data [stlouisfed.org]: "Below a graph, go to the “NOTES” section. Next to “Release” (on the right-hand side of the first line), click the name of the release (see the red box bel
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There's incentive to do
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I am really shocked at all the negative comments, and lack of familiarity with the tool.
I'm not. Slashdot is a place where everyone has a 2 second attention span and virtually all negative comments are by people who didn't even read far enough into the summary to know what FRED is.
And no I didn't read beyond that first sentence in your post because...
THIS...
IS...
SLAS*spittle*HDOOOOT!!!!
*kicks you down a well in slow motion*
The electronic shop I used to work in built a FRED (Score:3)
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Zoomer Nonsense (Score:2)
Economists have been using FRED since before the author was born.
Jeezeum crow.
Some USA thing (Score:2)
Never seen it, never heard of it. A bit of Googling revealed it is some US government thing.
Not all the world is America or cares. Not all the English-speaking world is America.
The other 95% of the world neither knows nor cares.
Everyone loves economic data???? (Score:2)
I'd guess less than 1% of the general public have the slightest interest in any economic database. I count myself in the 99%.