BIS Review 132/2007  3  Benefits of the enhanced projections The enhanced projections will provide the public with several types of useful information. In particular, I find it helpful to think of the projections as functioning in three different ways: as a forecast, as a provisional plan, and as an evaluation of certain long-run features of the economy.
However, I think it also reflects the fact that over the past ten years Japan’s economy has stagnated while the US economy has revived. Japan’s economy saw the peak of the bubble about ten years ago. At that time, Japanese firms and financial institutions were expanding their global market share and were full of confidence.