March 2018
Meet MARTIN, the RBA's New Macroeconomic Model
The Reserve Bank has begun using a new full-system macroeconomic model called MARTIN in policy analysis and forecasting. It is designed to be used as part of the Bank's existing processes for forecasting and analysis that use a range of information, models and staff assessments. MARTIN is already being used in these processes to help understand economic developments and quantify risks, and in time it will be used to extend forecasts beyond the usual two-to-three-year horizon.
Mining Investment Beyond the Boom
The construction phase of Australia's mining boom is now almost complete. In this article, we use two complementary approaches to investigate what mining investment might look like look over the next decade or so. The first approach explores the long-run determinants of mining investment and its likely long-run share of GDP. We then take a bottom-up approach, focusing on the amount of investment that will be required to maintain firms' existing productive capacity; in this approach we focus on Australia's three major commodities (coal, iron ore and liquefied natural gas). The analysis suggests that mining investment will likely make up a larger share of GDP than it did before the boom, and that it will continue to play an important role in driving movements in Australia's economic activity.
Structural Change in the Australian Economy
The structure of the Australian economy has changed significantly over the past 50 years. Services have become an increasingly important part of the economy. Supply chains have lengthened as traditional goods-producing industries have become more specialised in their core activities and outsourced their non-core activities to the business services sector. These developments have had significant implications for the composition of employment and the skill requirements of the Australian labour force.
Perceptions of Job Security in Australia
A concern that low job security is constraining wage growth has been expressed in many countries. Using data on Australian households over time, this article finds that workers' perceptions of their own job security have declined in recent years. This deterioration has occurred across many job and personal characteristics. These weaker job security perceptions have provided a small drag on wage growth.
Wage Growth in Advanced Economies
Nominal wage growth in advanced economies has been sluggish, despite unemployment in a number of places falling to levels consistent with full employment. This article finds that, in most economies, low wage growth does not reflect a weaker relationship with unemployment. Instead, lower productivity growth, the difficulty of cutting wages following the global financial crisis and a decline in labour's bargaining power help explain some of the wage sluggishness. There also appears to be a common, but yet unidentified, factor that has weighed on wages over the past two years.
Developments in Banks' Funding Costs and Lending Rates
This article updates previous Reserve Bank research on the composition and pricing of banks' debt funding and lending rates. The major banks' debt funding costs declined a little over 2017, primarily driven by a decline in the cost of deposits. Over the same period, overall lending rates were little changed, with higher household lending rates partly offset by lower business lending rates.
The Distribution of Mortgage Rates
Mortgage interest rates can vary considerably across borrowers and are typically less than the standard variable rates (SVRs) advertised by banks. This article uses loan-level data to explore the relationships between interest rates and the characteristics of borrowers and their loans. Mortgages with riskier characteristics tend to have higher interest rates. Discounts applied to SVRs have tended to increase over recent years, and are also influenced by the type of loan and its size.
Non-bank Financing in China
The rise of shadow banking activities over the past decade has provided a range of benefits to the Chinese economy and financial system. Yet, it has also raised considerable financial stability risks, prompting Chinese authorities to announce many changes to the regulatory and supervisory framework. This Bulletin article examines the nature and complexity of shadow banking and highlights the challenges facing the Chinese authorities.
High-denomination Banknotes in Circulation: A Cross-country Analysis
In Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, the number of high-denomination banknotes in circulation has increased at an above-trend rate in recent years. Evidence suggests that overseas demand might be a common driver of this elevated growth. Increased domestic demand for both transaction and store-of-value purposes may also have contributed, as well as responses to changes in government and central bank policies. This research was undertaken with assistance from members of the Four Nations Distribution Working Group, in line with the group's objective to explore banknote-related topics that are directly relevant to the member central banks.
Explainer: Australia's Inflation Target
The Bank is committed to supporting economics educators and students and we have been developing a suite of education resources and learning experiences. The resources include an ‘Explainer’ series which provides explanations about key economic concepts, the Australian economy and the role of the Bank. This Explainer looks at Australia's inflation target, why the Bank targets inflation and how the target works. While the Explainers are generally aligned with curricula for senior high school students, they are suitable for a range of audiences.
The graphs in the Bulletin were generated using Mathematica.
ISSN 1837-7211 (Online)