Economy snippets

vivatifosi

nickmason wrote: »

Hello all.

1/4 of all UK unemployment over the last year has been in Wales.
1/2 of all UK unemployment over the last quarter has been in Wales.
The public sector cuts haven't come in yet.

And alongside that, the Assembly is raising business rates - especially for tourism related businesses iirc.

I have a horrible feeling that the Welsh marketers know what they're talking about.

Thanks Nick, that make much more sense than the article.

lostinrates

nickmason wrote: »

Hello all.

1/4 of all UK unemployment over the last year has been in Wales.
1/2 of all UK unemployment over the last quarter has been in Wales.
The public sector cuts haven't come in yet.

And alongside that, the Assembly is raising business rates - especially for tourism related businesses iirc.

I have a horrible feeling that the Welsh marketers know what they're talking about.

Hello!

Thanks, those welsh have foundation to their pessimism indeed.

nickmason

lostinrates wrote: »

Hello!

Thanks, those welsh have foundation to their pessimism indeed.

I was recently at a lunch where the speaker announced that he can't stand it when people bombard with statistics, but he'd learnt them, so we'd damn well hear them all the same. In such a vein:
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/pdfdir/gva1209.pdf

shows that GVA (gross value added - broadly a productivity measure) in Wales is lower than any other region - 74.3 (against a national index of 100 - London is at 170). I believe this is almost twice the deficit from the norm it was in the mid 90s.

As you drill down, unsurprisingly, it gets worse - 4 of the 5 worst areas (out of 133) are in Wales, and Anglesey has a GVA of 1/10th that of Inner London West.

Mr_Mumble

The 7x issuance calc is simples:

£225bn gross issuance of gilts by the DMO this financial year
-£200bn BoE purchase of gilts for QE scheme
is a net £25bn

£175bn of gilts to be issued in FY 2010/11

£175bn/£25bn = 7

Generali

Ok, so Wales has a GDP/head of £15,237 measured by value added, an accepted if slightly unusual method of measuring GDP.

Assuming that all parts of the UK have broadly similar levels of Government expenditure, that would mean that an equal drop in Government spending across all areas would mean a disproportionate hit to Wales as there is a small private sector to provide employment and wealth creation.

lostinrates

Mr_Mumble wrote: »

The 7x issuance calc is simples:

£225bn gross issuance of gilts by the DMO this financial year
-£200bn BoE purchase of gilts for QE scheme
is a net £25bn

£175bn of gilts to be issued in FY 2010/11

£175bn/£25bn = 7

Is that meant to make some of us FEEL simple?

nickmason

Generali wrote: »

Does that mean that for 100 of input, Wales produces 74.3 of output?

No. Statistics are never that simple! But then I think you knew that.

I don't have the baseline inputs figure; this is simply looking at added value. It means that for ever 100 of added-value by an average Brit, the average Welshman is responsible for 74.3 of added-value. (Added-value is value of outputs minus value of inputs.)

Wales has 4.9% of the population. It is responsible for 3.6% of GVA. So figure is a per capita measure, and therefore any anomalies of population (composition, or flows) will skew the figures.

As the pdf report says: "GVA per head is a useful way of comparing regions of different sizes and is an important indicator for both domestic and European policy purposes. It is not, however, a measure of regional productivity, as the population estimates used to calculate it include the
economically inactive population."

Anybody still awake?

Generali

nickmason wrote: »

No. Statistics are never that simple! But then I think you knew that.

I don't have the baseline inputs figure; this is simply looking at added value. It means that for ever 100 of added-value by an average Brit, the average Welshman is responsible for 74.3 of added-value. (Added-value is value of outputs minus value of inputs.)

Wales has 4.9% of the population. It is responsible for 3.6% of GVA. So figure is a per capita measure, and therefore any anomalies of population (composition, or flows) will skew the figures.

As the pdf report says: "GVA per head is a useful way of comparing regions of different sizes and is an important indicator for both domestic and European policy purposes. It is not, however, a measure of regional productivity, as the population estimates used to calculate it include the
economically inactive population."

Anybody still awake?

HI nickmason,

I amended my post but you picked up on it prior to that!

Looking at the link, what struck me was the level of GDP/head in England, Scotland and Wales. England and Scotland are broadly smiilar, Wales is a long way behind if you measure by value added.

My recolection/belief is that the NE of England is in a worse position than Wales. These are places that are going to be in a lot of strife if UK Governmetn spending has to fall.

nickmason

Generali wrote: »

Ok, so Wales has a GDP/head of £15,237 measured by value added, an accepted if slightly unusual method of measuring GDP.

Assuming that all parts of the UK have broadly similar levels of Government expenditure, that would mean that an equal drop in Government spending across all areas would mean a disproportionate hit to Wales as there is a small private sector to provide employment and wealth creation.

I think I agree. There's also likely to be an accelerator (positive feedback) in there - GVA is lower in part because of a higher public sector, and so gov spending cuts will hit harder in terms of inputs to the growth-generating economy.


GVA is typically used rather than GDP because it factors out the effect of gov subsidy and taxation on products.

Generali

nickmason wrote: »

GVA is typically used rather than GDP because it factors out the effect of gov subsidy and taxation on products.

AIUI, other GDP measures should do the same by definition, it's just that they struggle to do so.