, we have developed hedonic price indexes for network routers and switches using, in the case of the former, data from product catalogs and, in the case of the latter, privately produced reports evaluating the performance of the products. however, hedonics are by no means a panacea. most important, the measured characteristics may be acting only as proxies for the qualities of the services that buyers ultimately value. this, again, raises the difficult issue of the appropriate scope for value measurement and poses the question of whether the correct approach may be to move toward directly pricing the services we obtain from our information processing systems rather than pricing separately the individual hardware components and the software. the federal reserve staff has found that, when detailed data are available on prices and on quantities, we can produce results that are comparable to those based on hedonics, using the conceptually simpler " matched model " approach. indeed, we have taken this approach in constructing j. steven landefeld and bruce t. grimm, " a note on the impact of hedonics and computers on real gdp, " survey of current business ( december 2000 ). ana aizcorbe, carol corrado, and mark doms, " constructing price and quantity indexes for high technology goods, " industrial output section, division of research and statistics, board of governors of the federal reserve system, july 26, 2000. quantity and price indexes for several high - tech items. in the case of semiconductors, we relied on data from three private vendors for information on nearly 100 unique microprocessors, more than 200 types of memory chips, and more than 80 other chips. we also acquired nominal sales and unit value data for about 1, 100 distinct computer models. neither hedonic nor matched - model techniques are sufficient to deal with the introduction of wholly new products that differ fundamentally in their characteristics from their predecessors. this will continue to be one of our major ongoing challenges. i am encouraged by the progress that economists and economic statisticians have been making to date in tackling the daunting task of measuring real output and prices in a rapidly changing economy. the challenge that lies ahead is, indeed, large, and to meet it will require the support of the business and academic communities to supply the information and to help develop the tools that our statistical agencies require. the information revolution, itself, will also surely play an important role. for example, high - tech information systems might

tiff macklem : opening statement - standing senate committee on banking, trade and economy opening statement by mr tiff macklem, governor of the bank of canada and ms carolyn rogers, senior deputy governor of the bank of canada, before the standing senate committee on banking, trade and the economy, ottawa, ontario, 1 november 2022. * * * good evening. i'm pleased to be here with senior deputy governor carolyn rogers to discuss our recent policy announcement and the bank of canada's monetary policy report ( mpr ). last week, we raised the policy interest rate by 50 basis points to 3. 75 %. this is the sixth consecutive increase since march. quantitative tightening continues and is complementing increases in the policy rate. we also expect our policy rate will need to rise further. how much further will depend on how monetary policy is working to slow demand, how supply challenges are resolving and how inflation and inflation expectations are responding to this tightening cycle. our decision last week reflected several considerations. first, inflation in canada remains high and broad - based, reflecting large increases in both goods and services prices. inflation has come down in recent months, but we have yet to see a generalized decline in price pressures. about two - thirds of the components of the consumer price index ( cpi ) have risen by more than 5 % over the last year. and rising prices for essentials like groceries and rent are hitting lower - income canadians particularly hard. second, and related, the economy is still in excess demand - it's overheated. job vacancies have declined from their peak but remain high, and businesses continue to report widespread labour shortages. with the economy now fully reopened, households want to enjoy many of the close - contact services they have missed, but businesses can't keep up, and we have seen prices for services rise rapidly. third, higher interest rates are beginning to weigh on growth. this is increasingly evident in interest - rate - sensitive parts of the economy, like housing and spending on big - ticket items. but the effects of higher rates will take time to spread through the economy. fourth, there are no easy outs to restoring price stability. we need the economy to slow down to rebalance demand and supply and relieve price pressures. we expect growth will stall in the next few quarters - in other words, growth will be close to zero. but once we get through this slowdown, growth will pick up, our economy will grow solidly, and the