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THE TREATMENT OF STOCK APPRECIATION IN THE MEASUREMENT OF NATIONAL INCOME *
Author(s) -
Haig Bryan
Publication year - 1973
Publication title -
review of income and wealth
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.024
H-Index - 57
eISSN - 1475-4991
pISSN - 0034-6586
DOI - 10.1111/j.1475-4991.1973.tb00900.x
Subject(s) - national income and product accounts , measures of national income and output , national accounts , economics , commonwealth , stock (firearms) , gross fixed capital formation , statistician , national wealth , national savings , net national income , gross national income , public economics , gross domestic product , finance , accounting , macroeconomics , gross income , political science , law , mechanical engineering , statistics , mathematics , state income tax , tax reform , engineering
In the latest official national income publication the Australian Commonwealth Statistician has altered the treatment of stock appreciation in the measurement of national income at current prices. Previously, stock appreciation had been included in both national expenditure and national product. Now the amount of stock appreciation (the difference between the change in the value of stocks and the value of the change in stocks) has been deducted from investment in stocks, and consequently national expenditure, and from trading incomes, and consequently national income. The former procedure (including stock appreciation in national expenditure and national product) had been advocated by the present author, when editor of the first official national income publications issued by the Commonwealth Statistician. In this note an attempt is made to set out the reasons for this view. A new approach is also suggested for handling the item of stock appreciation in national income accounts, which does not rest on the assumption that stock appreciation is a capital gain which should be excluded from trading incomes and national product.