The Australian Economy: In Brief
The Australian economy is highly dominated by its services sector, presenting 68% of Australian GDP, yet it is the agricultural and mining sectors that account for the bulk of Australia’s exports.
As Australia’s economy made a shift, turning its attention away from trade with the Western markets to trade within the Asia Pacific region, it has turned the country’s economy into one of the fastest growing advanced economies in the world.
Ranked third in the 2011 Economic Freedom Index behind Hong Kong and Singapore, Australia is the world’s thirteenth largest economy according to nominal GDP (current prices), the 17th largest according to GDP (PPP) and has the ninth highest per capital GDP, which is higher than that of the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Canada, Japan, and the United States.
Holding a position 16 in Global Competitiveness Index 2010–2011 rankings made by World Economic Forum, Australia ranks highly in many international comparisons of national performance such as human development, quality of life, health care, life expectancy, public education, economic freedom and the protection of civil liberties and political rights. All of Australia’s major cities fare well in global comparative livability surveys — Melbourne reached second place on The Economist’s 2008 World’s Most Livable Cities list, followed by Perth, Adelaide, and Sydney in fourth, seventh and ninth place respectively.
Over the previous two decades, Australia has enjoyed a period of uninterrupted economic growth – boasting of an average of 3.3 percent in real GDP growth annually and inflation has typically been 2–3 per cent and the base interest rate 5–6 per cent.
Australia possesses a well-diversified economy — boosted by the strength of its services and resources industries — and continues to provide an ideal environment for business and environment.
As with most advanced economies, Australia boasts of a dynamic service sector which includes industries such as banking, insurance and finance; the media and entertainment industries; consulting, tourism and retail; services provided by government, such as education, health and welfare; and other personal and business services.
Though Australia is the only country outside Europe in the top ten of the quality-of-life index and enjoys one of the highest standards of living in the G7, Australia has amongst the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.
Currently, the price of housing in terms of median incomes, with Australian capital city residential housing being among the most expensive in the world as well as the long drought and its impacts on retail food costs and export volumes of crops and meat and the possible impacts of climate change on agriculture has been of concern to the Aussies today.
Because of this, many Australians nowadays turns to payday cash loans providers in getting cash to keep up and stay afloat in this rising commodity prices.
With Australian banking institutions getting stricter with their payday loans in Australia requirements, I highly recommend to all Australians and its residents who are in need of cash to consider using online payday loans providers in borrowing cash for these online payday loans Australia providers have a more lenient payday cash loans requirements than these banking institutions.
Like Cash Advance, one of the leading advance cash loans providers in Australia, their payday loans requirements don’t discriminate. They don’t need loads of personal data and a proven credit history. All they need to know is their client has a stable job with enough income to be able to pay back their loan, an Australian citizen or resident, of legal age, that is must be at least 18 years old and has a current bank account — this is necessary for this is where the online instant cash provider will be directly depositing the cash that you borrowed as well as where you pay your loan back.
Among these industries, banking, finance and insurance are the best performers; providing the highest gross-value as well as being among the fastest growing industries in Australia. The Australian share market is the second largest in the Asia–Pacific region behind Japan, based on free-float market capitalization. The Australian Securities Exchange is also the 11th largest stock exchange in the world going by market capitalization.
While the service industry remains the backbone of Australia’s economy, Australia’s mining industry has been the catalyst for economic growth in the past decade. Large quantities of minerals and resources can be found in Australia. Australia has the world’s largest resources of recoverable brown coal, lead, rutile, zircon, nickel, tantalum, uranium and zinc, and ranks second in the world for bauxite, copper, gold, ilmenite and silver. Iron ore is another extremely valuable asset, with high demand from China.
The service sector of the economy, including tourism, education, and financial services, accounts for about 70 per cent of GDP
Australia is the only country outside Europe in the top ten of the quality-of-life index, s based on a unique methodology that links the results of subjective life-satisfaction surveys to the objective determinants of quality of life across countries
calculated in 2005 and includes data from 111 countries and territories
Source/Reference: DFAT.GOV.AU
