6467.0 - Pensioner and Beneficiary Living Cost Index, Mar 2011 
Quality Declaration
Quality Declaration ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 16/05/2011
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MARCH KEY POINTS THE ALL GROUPS PENSIONER AND BENEFICIARY LIVING COST INDEX (PBLCI)
OVERVIEW OF PBLCI MOVEMENTS
NOTES FORTHCOMING ISSUES
OUTCOME OF THE 16TH SERIES CPI REVIEW The ABS recently completed an extensive review of its CPI and has announced changes including the continued quarterly publication of the outlays based Pensioner & Beneficiary Living Cost Index (PBLCI). The weighting pattern used in the PBLCI will be updated from the September quarter 2011. For more details about changes to the PBLCI and the CPI, please refer to Information Paper: Outcome of the 16th Series Australian Consumer Price Index Review (cat. no. 6469.0), or www.abs.gov.au. IMPACT OF THE FLOODS AND CYCLONE YASI ABS price index compilation methodologies and quality assurance processes have ensured that any impact of the floods and cyclone on consumer prices is reflected in the data included in this publication. For further information see the section Impact of the floods and Cyclone Yasi within Consumer Price Index, Australia, March quarter 2011 (cat. no. 6401.0) for details. ROUNDING Any discrepancies between totals and sums of components in this publication are due to rounding. INDEX NUMBERS USE REFERENCE BASE OF JUNE QUARTER 2007 = 100.0 To allow comparison of the Pensioner and Beneficiary Living Cost Index with other ABS price indexes, all index numbers in this publication use a reference base of June quarter 2007 = 100.0. However, percentage changes used in this publication for the Consumer Price Index are as published in Consumer Price Index, Australia (cat. no. 6401.0). The percentage changes for Analytical Living Cost Indexes used in this publication are as published in Analytical Living Cost Indexes for Selected Australian Household Types (cat. no. 6463.0). INQUIRIES For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070. SUMMARY COMMENTARY THE PENSIONER AND BENEFICIARY LIVING COST INDEX The Pensioner and Beneficiary Living Cost Index (PBLCI) has been designed to answer the question: 'By how much would after tax money incomes need to change to allow age pensioners and other households whose principal source of income is government benefits to purchase the same quantity of consumer goods and services that they purchased in the base period?' The PBLCI has been derived by combining the age pensioner Analytical Living Cost Index (ALCI) and the other government transfer recipient ALCI. Living cost indexes are intended to measure the impact of changes in prices on the out-of-pocket expenses incurred by these particular household types. In the March quarter 2011 the PBLCI increased by 1.9%. The Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose by 1.6% over the same period. Since the PBLCI series began in June quarter 2007 it has risen 15.2%, compared to 12.2% for the CPI. Differences have occurred for a number of reasons that relate to factors that affect the component series used to compile the PBLCI. The inclusion of mortgage interest and consumer credit charges and the different treatments of housing and insurance in the PBLCI result in variations between the PBLCI and the CPI series. The expenditure patterns of age pensioner and other government transfer recipient households differ from those of the overall household sector covered by the CPI, which also contributes to differences in the percentage changes. For more information on the relationship between the PBLCI, CPI and the ALCIs, see the Explanatory Notes. Document Selection These documents will be presented in a new window.
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