5206.0 - Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Dec 2006  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 07/03/2007   
   Page tools: Print Print Page Print all pages in this productPrint All

RECENT RELEASES


AUSTRALIAN SYSTEM OF NATIONAL ACCOUNTS 2005-06 (Cat. No. 5204.0)

The Annual National Accounts publication, released on 1 November 2006, provides estimates for gross domestic product (GDP) and its components, the national income account, the national capital account, the national financial account and the national balance sheet. Income, capital and financial accounts and a balance sheet are provided for each sector of the economy. Also provided is a range of information classified by industry, details of capital formation (including capital stocks) and productivity statistics.


The ABS is in the process of migrating from a traditional paper-based publishing regime to a web-based publishing regime. With the ability to hyperlink information on the web site, there are new and innovative ways for effective communication to users of ABS information. The Annual National Accounts publication has taken some steps towards a full web-based publishing regime. While a PDF containing the majority of material within this publication has been produced, the commentary, is more effectively viewed on the ABS website. The ABS is looking for your feedback to help us improve future issues.



FEATURE ARTICLE - HOUSEHOLD SECTOR BALANCE SHEET

The feature article, 'Household Sector Balance Sheet - A National Accounts' Perspective', summarises the data published for the household sector by the ABS in the financial accounts and the national accounts more generally, and derives some analytical measures about the household balance sheet. The article analyses historical data on household assets and liabilities as well as their components. The article, released on 2 March 2007, can be found with the Australian System of National Accounts, 2005-06 (cat. no. 5204.0).



AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL ACCOUNTS, STATE ACCOUNTS (Cat. No. 5220.0)

The State Accounts published on 13 November 2006 included estimates of Gross state product and State final demand and its major components. These components include, household final consumption expenditure, government final consumption expenditure, private and public gross fixed capital formation and international trade. Household income by state and territory are also included in the publication.



IMPLEMENTING NEW ESTIMATES OF HOURS WORKED INTO THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL ACCOUNTS 2006 (Cat. No. 5204.0.55.003)

The ABS publishes indexes of hours worked in annual and quarterly national accounts. These indexes capture underlying trends in hours worked and are derived from estimates of hours actually worked by employed people. The ABS Labour Force Survey (LFS) provide the basic data from which these indexes are constructed. The hours worked indexes published in the National Accounts are important indicators in their own right as well as being fundamental building blocks required to estimate the indexes of labour productivity and multifactor productivity.


Over the past year, the ABS has considered options for improving the methodology used for estimating total hours worked and average hours worked per employee. This work has focused on improving the annual measures of both total and average hours worked.


This paper, released on 1 November 2006, describes both the previous and new methods used for estimating hours worked and gives an overview of the effect of the change on the hours worked index and related productivity indexes.



SPOTLIGHT ON NATIONAL ACCOUNTS (Cat. No. 5202.0)

On 15 November 2006, the ABS released the first issue of a new product, Spotlight on National Accounts (cat. no. 5202.0). The first Spotlight on National Accounts focused on 'Broader measures of progress other than Gross domestic product (GDP)'. Spotlight on National Accounts will consist of a relatively short piece of analysis that will focus on a particular theme. The themes to be explored aim to:

  • Provide users with increased understanding of the national accounts and associated ABS products
  • Provide statistical information on the underlying causes of certain economic phenomena
  • Inform users of improvements to concepts, sources and methods used in the National Accounts.

Producing Spotlights on National Accounts based on these aims will help expand users understanding of the compilation of the national accounts and their relationship to other statistics published by the ABS. Spotlight on National Accounts will be a web-based product released on an irregular basis. The web-based nature of the product will allow hyper-linking to more detailed information currently available on the ABS website.


It is anticipated that over the next 12 months there will be around four releases of Spotlight on National Accounts. The future topics may include an overview of the Household saving ratio, analysis of quarterly Labour productivity, description of the differences between State final demand and Gross State Product.



A SUPPLY AND USE FOR EDITING THE QUARTERLY NATIONAL ACCOUNTS, AUSTRALIA, RESEARCH PAPER, 2006 (Cat. No. 5258.0)

Released on 1 December 2006, this product describes the underlying framework of the experimental quarterly supply and use (QSU) model, its overall structure and how it is being used to aid the editing of quarterly Australian national accounts data. The ABS has developed and is experimenting with the use of a quarterly supply and use model as a data editing tool. It utilises the existing quarterly national accounts data and models the remaining data that are required in a supply and use approach.



AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL ACCOUNTS, FINANCIAL ACCOUNTS (Cat. No. 5232.0)

The Australian National Accounts - Financial Accounts publication, last released on 22 December 2006, provides quarterly estimates of the financial flows between sectors of the domestic economy and with the rest of the world. In addition, the publication provides estimates of the financial assets and liabilities owned by each sector and various sub-sectors at the end of each quarter. Other key estimates within the publication include the demand for credit by non-financial domestic sectors during the quarter, and their corresponding levels of credit outstanding. The next issue of the Financial Accounts publication will be released on 30 March.