The most familiar relates to the construction of forecasts that reflect our best estimates of future economic outcomes. 2 Each quarter in the Statement on Monetary Policy, we publish forecasts for Australia’s major trading partners’ GDP growth, as well as Australia’s terms of trade, GDP growth, unemployment rate and inflation over the next two-and-a-half years.
Even after accounting for these three factors – the slowdown overseas, weak growth in household disposable incomes and the drought – part of the slowing in the Australian economy remains unexplained. This is especially so taking into account the labour market data, which continue to paint a stronger picture of the economy than the GDP data.