Australia's private sector plunges into deep depression

This week’s Australian national accounts data for the June quarter was obviously a shocker, with real GDP plunging by 7.3% over Q1 and Q2, marking the worst recession in data dating back to the 1960s:

Every quarter, I like to dig a little deeper into the data to gauge the impact on the typical Australian. And on this front, the data is even worse.

First, the domestic economy (i.e. excluding net exports) collapsed. Per capita Gross National Expenditure and Domestic Final Demand (definitions here) dived by 8.0% and 7.4% respectively over the June quarter to levels not seen since 2007:

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About the author

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.

Australia’s private sector plunges into deep depression