Experts as Intermediaries

Klaus Gründler, Michael Lamla, Niklas Potrafke and Timo Wochner

No 12492, CESifo Working Paper Series from CESifo

Abstract: Households often struggle to understand policy interventions, limiting the effectiveness of policy transmission. We study how economic policy signals reach and influence households, focusing on the role of professional economists as interpretive intermediaries. When policy signals are complex and households face attentional limits, experts help filter and explain the information. Using a series of large-scale cross-national expert surveys and representative household experiments in Germany during the 2022–23 inflation surge, we show that (i) experts actively update and interpret monetary policy signals, (ii) their policy interpretations influence household expectations and spending decisions, and (iii) households prefer expert interpretations over direct communication from policymakers. Our findings highlight a previously overlooked transmission channel, suggesting that expert intermediation can substantially enhance the effectiveness of macroeconomic policy communication.

Keywords: economic experts; economic policy; macroeconomic expectations; monetary policy; belief formation; cross-national experiments (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E31 E71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ces:ceswps:_12492

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