Problem 1

Go to the website of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS): www.abs.gov.au.

Do the following:

1. Pick an economic series, such as the CPI, GDP, or something less obvious (e.g. hours worked, producer price index).

2. Download the series, plot it, and work out summary statistics for different time periods.

3. Describe the data, noting any points/periods of interest.

4. Find out how the series was constructed, and summarize.

5. Have there been any data revisions over the years? Describe what happened, and why.

Problem 2

Go to the website of one of the following:

❼ Central Statistical Agency of India,

❼ National Statistical Office of Papua New Guinea,

❼ Statistics Singapore,

❼ Malawi National Statistical Office,

❼ Tonga Department of Statistics,

❼ Croatia Bureau of Statistics.

Repeat the exercise in Problem 1, for the same choice of series. That is, if your chosen series for Problem 1 was the Wage Price Index, use the same data series for your country in this problem. If you can’t find the same series, then recommend and justify an alternative as a proxy.

Have some slides ready to share and discuss with the class!

Problem 3

Show that the Laspeyres quantity index, QL , can be written as value (e.g.  expenditure) growth divided by a Paasche price index, PP . That is, for Vt  = pt · qt  for t = 0, 1, show that QL  = (V /V )/P10P , where:

QL     ≡

PP     ≡

Problem 4

1. Show that the Laspeyres and Paasche price index number formulae have the following alternative expressions, where sn(t)  = pn(t)qn(t)/pt  · qt , period t expenditure share of good n:

PL     ≡

PP     ≡

=  sn(0)  ( )

= 「(l) sn(1)  ( ) − 1  − 1