Riding on That Truck: Big Data on the Economy
Researchers say detailed, real-time information on economic demand is available if they can collect and analyze the data
Researchers believe matching information about truck shipments with data about the movement of the vehicles can provide information about rapid changes in the economy. PHOTO: ASSOCIATED PRESS
There’s big information about the economy out on the road.
In an attempt to mine the enormous amount of data collected from trucks and other commercial vehicles that is going online, logistics technology company Fleetmaticsteamed up with George Mason University’s Stephen Fuller to analyze 74 billion data points logged from GPS-tracking devices installed in 552,000 vehicles owned by small businesses across the country.
Using telematics—the transmission of large amounts of computerized information over long distances using wireless technology—the researchers are examining whether data on the movement of goods-carrying trucks can be corralled to provide a timely view of the direction of consumer spending, business investment and other economic fundamentals.
Mr. Fuller charted the vehicular activity of small businesses alongside historical retail sales recorded by the U.S. Census Bureau since 2011, and found that the numbers are so closely correlated that they could be used as real-time economic indicators. For example, he said, he projected in March 2015 that retail sales had expanded in the first quarter before the U.S. Census Bureau confirmed it on April 14.
“What’s potentially interesting about this type of data is the rate at which it is collected—in near real time,” Mr. Fuller wrote in a report, published in April. “Existing indicators typically report only monthly or quarterly…the data are essentially already at least a month old and largely consist of estimated values.”
There is a long history of people trying to use freight data to make larger, predictive points about the economy, including Alan Greenspan when he was chairman of the Federal Reserve and Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Chairman Warren Buffett , who were fond of the detailed data on the weekly movement of commodities by North American freight railroads.
Mr. Fuller and Fleetmatics, a Waltham, Mass.-based company that uses GPS technology to provide commercial fleet management services, want to add small business vehicles to that list, and say technology can make data collection even faster.
The report comes as companies from automakers to retailers and hotel companies are grappling with big data, in many cases collected from Internet-enabled products, andhow to use it to their advantage.
In the supply chain and logistics world, GPS-enabled trackers are being installed in everything from trucks to shipping containers, but companies are in the early stages of figuring out how the information from those objects can be gathered consistently and used for applications like real-time engine diagnostics.
