How clear is the public’s understanding of economic policy and its likely outcomes? FRED includes a data series that seeks to answer this question: In a recent paper, Scott Baker, Nicholas Bloom, and Steven Davis developed an index that estimates the level of uncertainty about economic policy by accounting for newspaper references to uncertainty, tax codes, and disagreement among forecasters.

The authors refer to spikes in the index that occurred during important events such as “tight presidential elections, Gulf Wars I and II, the 9/11 attack, and other major shocks.” More-recent events include the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy, the euro crisis, and the debt-ceiling deadlock.

The Federal Reserve has been making an effort to reduce uncertainty by increasing clarity and transparency with respect to its policies. As noted in a previous blog post, FRED also allows you to track the projections made by FOMC members. (Read full-text FOMC statements back to 2009 on the Board’s website.)

How this graph was created: Search for “Economic Policy Uncertainty Index” and change the frequency to “Weekly, Ending Friday.”

Suggested by Abhinav Chhabra