Economic and financial map of Argentina: A geo-referenced system of demand, supply and market indicators for financial services at the locality level

Working papers | 2012 | N 59

Abstract

In economics and finance, it is customary to think and work recognizing the temporal dimension of economic and financial processes. Thus, time is given a relevant role in the decision-making process – with concepts such as the intertemporal discount rate, net present value, compound interest, etc. –; It is used to present information – graphs with the time variable on the x-axis dominate economic reports and time series invade specialized financial reports; Statistical models based on temporal sequences are relied upon to interpret, analyze and predict social processes – econometric models such as ARIMA, VAR, VEC, etc. They are today a specific niche of knowledge and methodological progress in the field of econometrics–; and those who aspire to train in disciplines related to economics are exposed early to notions such as the “short”, “medium” and “long” term. Time invades our professional practice. In 1995 Robert C. Merton warned that “The primary function of every financial system is to facilitate, in an uncertain environment, the allocation and deployment of economic resources both spatially and temporally”2. However, in practice, we have paid more attention to “temporal allocation” and “contextual uncertainty” than to “spatial deployment”… and this is a problem.