Everyone that provides a forecast that others depend on should really be on the hook to report on the outcome, and to provide the forecast error distribution, if the forecast is one they make regularly.
I remember actually importing all the WSJ economic forecast surveys and testing the accuracy of each forecaster to find out which one I should bet my money on in the future. The results were... unimpressive for all of them. What they call forecasts aren't really rigorously modeled predictions of the future. Pretty much all of them come down to a very simple formula of long-term mean reverting growth rates. The forecasters that got awards for best forecast were either always optimistic and got the award during good economic periods or always pessimistic and got it during an unprecedented recession. So disappointing. I really believed in it before I studied the numbers.
