Why do we need such data more frequently than quarterly?
An excellent question when you consider the number of times the Unemployment new-files weekly get adjusted in the weeks following. Last weeks was messed up because a large district (I don’t think they ever said) had a “glitch” so didn’t report. That caused the Unemployment new-files to under-report.
Just one of many ways to jigger the stats.
“Why do we need such data more frequently than quarterly? “
When I was in high rate production and there was a problem the tippy-top management demanded ever more frequent data snapshots. They believed that having more and more data was management. Then, they’d direct me to do sometimes ridiculous things based on data that was constantly moving. The real trends were not visible in the ever increasingly small snapshots. (This might not be the best example but think of the data as being snapshots of a flock of flying birds. You draw a line across the picture and sometimes there’s more above than below, but it’s essentially not relevant. If you want to count the birds do it once a quarter while they’re in stead state and you have a better picture.)