Conference Board of Canada's Credibility is Dropping Faster than the Markets...

Which is bad since it was a penny stock to start with...

I was going to write a post making fun of the Conference Board of Canada for their fantasyland projection that Canada would have GDP growth of 2.2% next year and that there would be no recession.

Alas, I waited a whole week and now they have revised their forecast! Apparently, it was just in this past week that the conference board figured something might be amiss with the economy. Even Stephen Harper noticed sooner than that!

Luckily for me, their forecast is still very mockable, predicting 1.5% GDP growth next year, and no recession. Of course, if they keep revising their forecast every week, the one they make with one week left in the year next year should be reasonably accurate, although I wouldn't bet on it, with their track record.

I know, I know, various institutions, think tanks and government agencies have never proven themselves capable of doing any better with their macroeconomic forecasts than you could do by simply predicting next year's numbers will look like last year's numbers, but I guess it's just part of human nature to want to believe that we are in control and understand what's going on and can forecast these things. But when you make big revisions to your forecast one week after you make it, it kind of dents the illusion a little bit...