Studying Spatial Economic Relationships

1. Studying Spatial Economic Relationships Presenter: Dr Karen Malam Regions research BITRE

2. Regional economies • Boundaries • Functional unit • Customised • Data • Small area estimation • Survey data

3. Industry Structure • Differences in regional industry structure plays a significant, but partial, role in explaining differences in regional economic growth. • A region's industry structure is closely tied to the size of its economy – but what is a regional economy? • Needed to develop working zone boundaries Information paper 49

4. Working zones Local Government Areas BITRE’s Working zones • Labour market - economic functional area • Based on commuting flows between Statistical Local Areas

5. Map of Melbourne’s Working Zone Research report 125 Source: BITRE 2011a

6. Commuting to Wyndham North SLA Source: BITRE 2011a

7. Melbourne 2030 activity centres BITRE 2011a

8. Population movements Research report 122 BITRE 2011b

9. Population movements, 2001 to 2006 Major Cities Unit, Department of Infrastructure and Transport2011

10. Household Wealth • To improve understanding of household wealth & its relevance to regional wellbeing • To explore the relationship between regional wealth and regional income • To develop and analyse new measures of household wealth for Australia’s regions • 2003-04 snapshot Information paper 63

11. Methodology • Small area estimation • ABS Survey of Income and Housing 2003-04 • Provides capital city/state balance benchmarks for each wealth component • Small area data sources: • Valuer -General’s data on property sales • ATO Taxation Statistics • Census data • Other ABS data • Estimates produced for 1135 Statistical Local Areas

12. Average household wealth, 2003-04 BITRE 2009

13. Comparison of wealth and income BITRE 2009

14. Social Capital • Analyse the spatial dimensions of social capital in Australia. • Explore the extent to which social capital is related to particular aspects of the economic and social wellbeing of Australia’s regions. • Measure key elements of social capital at a regional scale. Information paper 55

15. Methodology • ABS Social Capital framework • Data sources • Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) • ABS General Social Survey • Boundaries • Capital cities and Balance of state • Remoteness classification • 69 BITRE defined regions • 33 Social Capital indicators

16. Network structure Network transactions Network types Network qualities • Frequency of social contact • Usage of email or chat sites in the • last 12 months • Proportion who live in the same SLA • as they did 5 years ago • Could ask someone for a favour • Capacity to raise $2000 in a week • for emergency • Integration into the community • I often feel very lonely • Only get together socially once a • months or less with friends or • relatives • Feeling of safety at home after dark • Neighbours helping each other out • Volunteering rate • Active membership • Labour force participation rate Examples of indicators BITRE 2005

17. Community involvement BITRE 2005

18. Concluding remarks • Regional economies • Boundaries • Administrative • ABS – Mesh blocks • Functional area • Customised area • Availability of data • Wide variety of sources (sometimes of varying quality). • Development of new datasets • Confidentiality and small sample size

19. Karen Malam BITRE Regional Research karen.malam@infrastructure.gov.au <www.bitre.gov.au>