California contributes approximately 14% of of the US GDP. If it were a nation its economy would rank just behind China’s and Italy’s for size.
New South Wales contributes 33.1% of Australian GDP. Victoria is next with 24.2%, Queensland with 18.9% and Western Australia with 12.3%. The remainder are in single figures.
If New South Wales was a nation it would be the 28th largest economy on the planet; bigger than South Africa or Greece and rivaling Poland, Austria and Norway.
I have put NSW and California on a graph in red. A larger version of the graph can be viewed here.
It makes you wonder why NSW puts up with so much centralisation from the federal government.
PM Quiz
Since the above is a short post answer these questions on birthplace and Australian Prime Ministers:
- How many Prime Ministers have been born in Queensland?
- Name the Prime Minister born in Tasmania.
- Have more Prime Ministers been born in Chile or Western Australia?
- Have more Prime Ministers been born in Scotland, England or South Australia?
- How many Prime Ministers have been born in NSW?
- How many Prime Ministers have been born in Victoria?*
* assume Gorton was born in Melbourne.
Because the centralisation happens in NSW, would be my answer.
Jacques, The early centralisation was definitely a Victorian thing, but since then I think it is a fair statement that it has been one of consensus between NSW and Victoria.
btw added a quiz
A quiz, eh? Having scoop withdrawal I’m guessing.
Jacques, Do the poll!
1: None.
2: Sir Innerdangle Bottomapple.
3: Bob Hawke counts for 2, so WA.
4. SA.
5. Heaps.
6. Not quite as heaps.
Oh no Jacques. Zero for six. “Australian Australians for a more Australian Australia” are left no choice but to revoke your citizenship and send you back to Arnhem Land.
Whaaaaat? No Prime Minister has ever come from Qld if you believe to the comments at Larva Pro. Which I shan’t any more!
It’s sounding like an idea for yet another Wikipedia “List Of…”. They already have lists of country subdivisions by area and population, so why not nominal GDP?
(NSW comes in at number 20 and 130, respectively.)
If we all just seceded from the Commonwealth we may all be better off. I suspect WA would be.
There are around 14 US states that are bigger than NSW and if you looked at the regions of China, Japan and UK it would push NSW down any sensible ranking even further.
Excellent pointers to maps following this idea (not only GDP but life expectancy) this post at Strange Maps and following on from this.
(When Oz is mapped by GDP or life expectancy, we end up near the “Great Lakes” states in the north/west of the US)
ECONOMIC ACTIVITY vs GDP
CAM said:
Sorry (sort of) to quibble, but I suspect that this is incorrect, given the far larger black economy and household sector in South Africa than in Australia – acreas of activity that do not find their way into GDP stats.
Given that mining only accounts for something like 4% of Australia’s GDP, perhaps the next election would look a little brighter if WA were forced to secede from Australia.
Have fun starving to death without us.
Australia: Riding on WA’s Back for 180 years and counting.
You’re out by about 74 years there, Yobbo.
WA – sponging off the rest of us and bitching about it for 106 years. And counting.
Gummo,
Our farmers and miners had to pay massive tariffs for decades to support (inter alia) the (American owned) car industry over East. Successive brilliant Canberra governments thought we did not have enough iron ore, so banned its export. I could go on, but you will ignore me anyway.
NSW and Victoria – to suffused in their own imagined brilliance to even have the wit to imagine they might be useless.
Hey Yobbo, all we hear from east of Kal is white noise right? (and you certainly get nothing on broadband).
Hopefully the Australian Federation will work like our labour contracts, last on first off!
PS: note for peasants; when being chased by a new australian army tank, run across a bridge, it will not follow.
Mining contributes 35% of export earnings and employs a bucketload of well-paid people. It also pays billions of dollars into Commonwealth revenue. We’d all be up the creek without it.
It happens that Western Australia and the Northern Territory are vast and much less explored than the heavily-populated eastern seaboard, which is why they are coming into their own as mining/export powerhouses.
Anyone really interested in LEGAL FACTS rather then LEGAL FICTION can always log on to my website http://www.schorel-hlavka.com or my blog at
http://au.360.yahoo.com/profile-ijpxwMQ4dbXm0BMADq1lv8AYHknTV_QH
OK you might just discover that the Framers of the Constitution held that the colonies themselves were regarded countries and that there is no such country as the Commonwealth of Australia as it is not even a dominion as it is a POLITICAL UNION. Therefore forget about handing in AUSTRALIAN CITIZENSHIP as a NATIONALITY, as it doesnt exist as such, it is a POLITICAL STATUS.
And there is a lot more to this, as set out on my blog and website.
And, if the High Court of Australia was deemed to be right about the Australia Act 19086 (I do not agree with it) then forget about the Commonwealth of Australia existing as it doesnt either. As the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (UK) federated the colonies but the Australia Act purports to be a federation under the Queen of Australia, a non existing country!
As for the contribution of States, well anyone ever has read Section 94 of the constitution?
If that was followed we all would be a lot better of, in particular if all the ex politicians who are getting, so to say, tax free job-for-the-mates were charged tax as is constitutionally required.
The Constitution is there but just the politicians couldnt care less about it.
Didnt the Framers of the constitution state;
HANSARD 11-3-1891 Constitution Convention Debates
Mr. CLARK:
Representative government is not an expedient or a makeshift to obviate the necessity of having every man brought into one chamber to give his vote; but it is a substantial institution devised for the special purpose of endeavouring, so far as possible, to get the intelligence and the judgment of the community to decide what shall, and what shall not, be law, and not simply to count mere heads.
?
Well, if just we could manage this after more then 100 years we would get there.
How you going with that, Mr G.H.? Gotten anywhere useful, ever?
Andrew, what, do the eastern states not have farmers or miners either? Quite a few more farmers than WA, and historically just as many or more miners. Though they’re all whining special interest groups. Fine, bugger off sandgropers, you’d be missed less than you think.
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Mining contributes about 35% of total exports from Australia, and about 48%* of mining and petroleum production comes from Western Australia – so assuming WA exports all it’s mining, which seems unlikely, WA mining accounts for about 17% of exports – slightly more than it’s fair share, if we count all states as equal.
But all states are not equal — WA’s land area represents 34% of the total area of Australia. So based only on mining output, WA is substantially underperforming when compared to land available to the rest of the country – it is about half as productive as the rest of the country. Let’s not even talk about WA’s very low contribution to overall GDP (5%).
It’s little wonder there’s so much money being sunk into WA, since there is obviously a lot of room to improve.
Somehow, I think we in the east would survive without them.
* HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES INQUIRY INTO RESOURCES EXPLORATION IMPEDIMENTS August 2002
Oops, my bad, WA’s GSP is about 11% of the total for Australia. Still a long way to go folks!
Mark
Bear in mind that the resources boom is only on in earnest in the past 18 months. Also bear in mind that as I say above, there are still massive untapped mineral deposits all over WA, the NT, SA and Qld which are undiscovered or undeveloped. The best is yet to come.
But really, why the pissing contest? Australia is like any economy, it gains from trade and specialisation.
So Mark, what you’re saying is that 5% of Australia’s population contributes 11% of Australia’s GDP?
That is the point yobbo … exactly … consider contributions on a per capita basis …
ps. was there an announcement this week by Rudd that the whole of australia will feel the fallout from the NW gas explosion ?? Why is that ??? How can such a small inconsequential state such as WA have any effect on the rest of Australia — something doesnt add up …