GOOGLE’DA YAPILAN BAZI KELİME ARAMALARI SEFALET ENDEKSİNİ ETKİLER Mİ?

1970 yılında Arthur Okun tarafından literatüre sunulan Sefalet Endeksi, işsizlik ve enflasyon oranlarının toplamıyla elde edilmektedir. Özellikle 2019 yılının son günlerinde ortaya çıkan COVİD-19 salgını neticesinde dünya genelinde sefalet endeksinde bir artış gözlemlenmiştir. İletişim teknolojilerinde yaşanan hızlı gelişmeler, insanların hayat tarzlarında da çok ciddi değişimlere öncülük etmiş ve sosyal yaşantının online dünyada şekillenmesini sağlamıştır. Alışveriş, eğlence ve iletişim konusunda internetin önemi yadsınamaz hale gelmiştir. İnsanlar merak ettikleri her konuyu internet üzerinden araştırmaya başlamıştır. Bu husus, internet arama motorlarının da işlevselliğini artırmıştır. İnternette yapılan aramalar, servis sağlayıcılar tarafından kamuoyuna sunulmaktadır. Bunların en popüler olanı ise Google Trend’dir. Bu mecradan elde edilen verilerin bazı ekonomik göstergeler ile ilişkisinin olabileceği literatürde tartışılmaktadır. Bu çalışmada da, Türkiye özelinde 2006-2022 tarihleri arasında aylık olarak ortaya çıkan sefalet endeksi ve yine bu dönemi kapsayan Google Trend’den elde edilen sefalet endeksini gösteren kelimelerin aranma endeksi verileri arasındaki ilişki incelenmektedir. Dönem dönem yaşanan keskin değişimlerin etkisini göz ardı etmemek adına yapısal kırılmalı modeller tercih edilmiş ve sefalet endeksi ve arama trendi arasındaki eşbütünleşme ve nedensellik ilişkisi incelenmiştir. Elde edilen bulgular, her iki değişkenin de birbirlerini etkilediğini ortaya koymaktadır.

Anahtar Kelimeler:

İşsizlik, enflasyon, sefalet endeksi, google trend, yapısal kırılma

DO SOME WORD SEARCHES ON GOOGLE AFFECT THE MİSERY INDEX?

The Misery Index, which was presented to the literature by Arthur Okun in 1970, is obtained by the sum of unemployment and inflation rates. In particular, as a result of the COVID-19 epidemic that emerged in the last days of 2019, an increase in the misery index was observed throughout the world. The rapid developments in communication technologies have led to serious changes in people's lifestyles and have enabled social life to be shaped in the online world. The importance of the internet in shopping, entertainment and communication has become undeniable. People have started to research every subject they are curious about on the internet. This has also increased the functionality of internet search engines. Internet searches are made available to the public by service providers. The most popular of these is Google trending. It is discussed in the literature that the data obtained from this channel may be related to some economic indicators. In this study, the relationship between the monthly misery index between 2006-2022 in Turkey and the search index data of words showing the misery index obtained from Google trend covering this period is examined. In order not to ignore the effect of the sharp changes experienced from time to time, structural break models were preferred and the cointegration and causality relationship between the misery index and the search trend were examined. The findings reveal that both variables affect each other.

Keywords:

Unemployment, inflation, misery index, google trend, structural break,

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