Do Accounting Earnings Forecast Macroeconomic Growth? Evidence from an Earnings Structure Perspective

Published in Scientific Decision Making, a CSSCI core journal jointly hosted by the Chinese Society of Social and Economic System Analysis (a national first-class academic society) and the Development Research Center of the State Council (ISSN 1006-4885; CN 11-3472/G3). Drawing on nearly a decade of firm-level accounting data for China’s A-share listed companies (Wind and CSMAR), the paper develops an empirical framework that decomposes aggregate earnings into structural components and tests their predictive power for macroeconomic growth. The results provide evidence that the composition of accounting earnings, not just their level, carries information about future GDP, contributing to the literature linking financial reporting to macroeconomic forecasting.