University of Sydney Lecture round 2

Today we once again visited the University of Sydney to be lectured by Geoff Dow and Frank Stilwell. It was very interesting to listen to both their “unconventional” view on economics. It was a long day for two lectures but I feel like both Geoff and Frank were able to feed off of each other to create a good dynamic describing the Australian economy.

Geoff used GDP per capita, the human development index, and government outlays vs. tax receipts to compare Australia to the rest of the world. Per capita GDP is a measure of total final goods and services made with in a country in one year per person. This is not a perfect measure to judge a country by in a world ranking because you can have a high GDP per capita like Singapore but end up having a very low Human Development Index rating. The Human Development Index bases its rating on longevity of life, literacy rates, and education. This is a better basis to rank countries because standard of living is important and is a better reflection of how well countries’ population is living compared to the rest of the world. Finally, government outlays and tax receipts is a good way to compare how much the government spends versus the size of the government. Even though governments are getting smaller expenditures are still increasing and deficit spending is still on the rise. Frank emphasized how the impacts of the economy affect the country. He focused on social, ecological and economic imbalances and their implications. I believe the ideas he brought forward about carbon emissions are paramount because it is something that will be discussed and debated about until things are put into place and after they are in effect within society.

During WWII it was a wartime economy. After the war, in the 1950s, there was an economic boom and industry was expanding and an expansion in infrastructure (the Snowy Mountain scheme). Now it has changed into a large exporter and is enjoying an appreciating dollar. GDP has steadily grown; Australia had had a streak of 30 years of economic growth. Due to the recession it has had a brief lapse but has projected growth for 2010. When it comes to inflation Australia has stayed right around a 3% average which is the goal for the US. Australia’s current account has been negative due to a deficit in all accounts (merchandise trade, services trade, income payable, and transfers). Today Australia mainly exports goods to China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, India, and the United States.