Ajka/Tajka history

In 1976-96 once or twice a year an overall economic forecast was made. The main application of the model, however, was in economics education. It has been used on the Helsinki School of Economics and a number of other colleges and universities, as well as in basic education, in particular in the additional post-graduate education. Also, several business organizations and educational institutions have used the Ajka model. Basic macroeconomics.

In 1982, my doctor's dissertation was based on the Ajka model. When conceiving the dissertation I became acquainted with the idea of optimization and since then the model has been in use in two versions: PolAjka and ForAjka. The latter may be used for forecasting and policy alternatives calculations. PolAjka is the optimization version of the model. It has four target variables, combined with weights to a loss function, which the user tries to minimize using as instruments about ten exogenous policy variables.

The PolAjka version of the model has been for many years at the disposal of the visitors of the Heureka Science exhibition.

The structure and contents of the national accounts was changed in the mid 1990's and new data was not available for some time in long enough series for model use. At that time I also retired, believing that I will leave my Ajka model once and for all. The opposite has happened. A long time user of the model Hannu Törmä suggested in 2002 that I should renew the model and put it running again. After two years of work it was done. Now, all its functions are combined in a single program as Tajka model (second Ajka, Törmä Ajka ).