Contributed by Phil Drew

Some stats about OZ for your next BBQ discussion:

Largest economies: OZ 13.

Resilience to economic crisis: 2 of 25, behind Norway.

Prosperity index: 4 behind Norway, Denmark and Finland.

GDP growth (2010): 2.7%, 15th. 12 of the 1st 14 are from Asia. The other 2 are Russia and UAE. (World average 4.0%)

Unemployment: 5.3%, 5 of 25, 600,000 jobs created since 2007.

Budget deficit to GDP: 7 of 25, at 1.4%, USA 9.1%.

Government debt to GDP: 2 of 22, at 8.3% behind Denmark (USA 76.7%)

Financial systems and capital markets: 5 of 59 behind USA, UK, HK and Singapore.

Top 500 Asian banks: 3 of 500, third largest pool of bank assets after China and Japan.

Service sector employment: 10 of 30 at 75.5%.

Foreign born labour: 2 of 21 at 26.9% behind Luxembourg, 10.2% from UK, Ireland and Oceania.

Political stability: 7 of 25, recent fall (from 2 in 2009) due to hung Parliament.

Index of economic freedom (of trade): 3 of 190+, behind HK and Singapore.

Transparency/Corruption index: 8 of 190+.

Corporate business index: 6 of 38.

Quality of life index: 4 of 25 behind Switzerland, Austria and Norway.

Human development index: 2 of 190+, behind Norway.

OECD Better life index:
– Life satisfaction 2010: 4 of 34 behind Denmark, Canada and Norway.
– Life expectancy 2010: 3 of 34 behind Japan and Switzerland.
– Health and environment/pollution problems: 4 of 59 behind Iceland, Finland and Austria.

Taken from: Australia: a wealth of opportunities, Benchmark report 2011. Austrade.