Toll Index

The Toll Index (TI) is a new monthly indicator for the German business cycle and is offered by the International Data Service Center (IDSC) of IZA as a service to forecasting practitioners and policy makers alike. The TI measures the monthly transportation activity performed by heavy transport vehicles across the country and has highly desirable availability properties (insignificant revisions, short publication lags) as a result of the innovative technology underlying its data collection. It is coincident with production activity due to the prevalence of just-in-time delivery. The Toll Index is an early indicator of production as measured for instance by the German Production Index, provided by the Federal Statistical Office - Germany, which is a well-known leading indicator of the Gross National Product. Which we suggest should be established more around the world.