202001

This article explores the potential for market-based inflation measures to improve inflation forecasting. To do so, I compare the pseudo-real time forecasting performance of a suite of models for forecasting total or “headline” PCE inflation over the short and medium run. In the forecasting exercise, a simple model using only market-based core PCE inflation showed the best forecasting performance at all horizons. A consensus view among policymakers is that monetary policy affects the economy with a lag. For this reason some policymakers emphasize the importance of setting monetary policy in a forward-looking manner, in which case better forecasting tools for key macroeconomic variables like inflation can lead to better policy. Recognizing that the key objective facing policymakers involves not just monitoring, but also forecasting, means that a host of methods have the potential to yield benefits over simply examining the most recent data point of the variable that policymakers aim to influence. When it comes to inflation, there is already some conventional wisdom that the best forecasting approach may involve the use of not only the total or “headline” measure of inflation but also other related series. For example, many commentators focus on core inflation measures to “filter out” the volatility of food and energy prices, which, historically, has often proved to be transitory. The excessive volatility of certain components is not the only potential shortcoming of relying...

Friendship and, indeed, a wide range of social connections, weak and strong, which require time, support, tolerance, loyalty, and reciprocity are, it turns out, conducive to physical as well as mental health. In Friendship, Lydia Denworth, a contributing editor to Scientific American and the author of I Can Hear You Whisper: An Intimate Journey Through the Science of Sound and Language and Toxic Truth: A Scientist, A Doctor and the Battle Over Lead, draws on a raft of research by social scientists, neurobiologists, geneticists, primatologists, and evolutionary biologists to examine how social bonds are developed and maintained, and their impact on well-being and longevity. Grounded in the still-contested premise that “stripped to its essence, everything psychological is biological,” Friendship is an engaging, and immensely informative, primer on the social brain, “the need to belong, tend, and befriend.” Source: Photo by Helena Lopes from Pexels Denworth demonstrates that Science by Jim House, a professor at the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research, pulled together all existing population studies and follow-up data on mortality over the subsequent six or more years, concluded that “social relationships, or the relative lack thereof,” rival cigarette In contrast to social isolation, which increases susceptibility to inflammation and viral infection, feelings of fulfillment and a web of social connections may well strengthen the ability of the immune system...

Source: Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash Ever wondered how you should journal? Learn eight ways that you can use journaling to reduce One of the great things about journaling is there is no "wrong" way to do it. You can even have fun journaling. Journaling is all about dumping that stuff floating around in your head and then being able to walk away from it. By externalizing your thoughts and feelings through journaling, you tend to have less to "carry around" psychologically. Your brain will thank you. Journaling also gives you the unique ability to look back and see how much you have grown, both emotionally and spiritually. Keep in mind that all the written forms of journaling can be done through audio recording as well. See my article on Visual Journaling In art journaling, the journal is more focused on visual design than words. You can even turn your words into artistic representations. As I referenced in my article on how to get started on journaling (link above), art Consider using mixed media in your journaling — using different forms of art, such as pencil, paint, and paper. You don't need to spend any money to create a visual journal. One client of mine uses photos from old magazines to create her visual journals. When you are doing gratitude journaling, you can write down things in your life that you are thankful for, or things that make you happy or content. Sometimes people go with a once-daily "write five things that I am thankful for," and others write in...

I have a dataframe with a yearweek column that I want to convert to a date. The code I wrote seems to work for every week except for week '202001' and '202053', example: df = spark.createDataFrame([ (1, "202001"), (2, "202002"), (3, "202003"), (4, "202052"), (5, "202053") ], ['id', 'week_year']) df.withColumn("date", F.to_date(F.col("week_year"), "yyyyw")).show() I can't figure out what the error is or how to fix these weeks. How can I convert weeks 202001 and 202053 to a valid date? Dealing with ISO week in Spark is indeed a headache - in fact this functionality was deprecated (removed?) in Spark 3. I think using Python datetime utilities within a UDF is a more flexible way to do this. import datetime import pyspark.sql.functions as F @F.udf('date') def week_year_to_date(week_year): # the '1' is for specifying the first day of the week return datetime.datetime.strptime(week_year + '1', '%G%V%u') df = spark.createDataFrame([ (1, "202001"), (2, "202002"), (3, "202003"), (4, "202052"), (5, "202053") ], ['id', 'week_year']) df.withColumn("date", week_year_to_date('week_year')).show() +---+---------+----------+ | id|week_year| date| +---+---------+----------+ | 1| 202001|2019-12-30| | 2| 202002|2020-01-06| | 3| 202003|2020-01-13| | 4| 202052|2020-12-21| | 5| 202053|2020-12-28| +---+---------+----------+ Based on mck's answer this is the solution I ended up using for Python version 3.5.2 : import datetime from dateutil.relativedelta import relativedelta import pyspark.sql.funct...

The methods are applicable to a vehicle, boat, machine or device powered by an internal combustion engine or battery powered electric motor. Operation of all engines or motors (main and auxiliary) of a vehicle, boat, machine or device is included. All equipment normally operating when the vehicle, boat, machine or device is in operation is included. Operator controlled equipment is included or excluded as specified in the individual document parts. As a special case, CISPR 12 applies to battery powered floor finishing equipment, but robot carpet sweepers are excluded. By reference, IEC CISPR 12 and CISPR 25 are adopted as the standards for the measurement of vehicle emissions. In the event that an amendment is made or a new edition is published, the new IEC document shall become part of this standard six months after the publication of the IEC document. SAE reserves the right to identify exceptions to the published IEC documents with the exceptions to be documented in SAE J551-2 and SAE J551-4, respectively. Also by reference, ISO 11451-2, ISO 11451-3 and ISO 11451-4 are adopted as standards for the measurement of vehicle immunity. In the event that an amendment is made or a new edition is published, the new ISO document shall become part of this standard six months after the publication of the ISO document. SAE reserves the right to identify exceptions to the published ISO documents with the exceptions to be documented in SAE J551-11, SAE J551-12 and SAE J551-13, respecti...