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Today’s Friday Fact is brought to you by The Facts. Did you know that this Government’s Net Core Crown Debt doubled in just three years? The debt mound has become a mountain.
Are we OK with this increase in government debt?
Notes:
- The data series provided by Treasury started in the June 2012 year.
- We have used blue and red colour-coding to show which political party led the government in each year.
- The June 2018 year shows dual colours due to the election taking place on 23 September 2017, NZ First choosing their government coalition partner on 19 October, and the Labour-led Government governing from 26 October.
- We only showed one forecast year on the graph (2023) due to:
- The large variance between the 2022 actuals and the 2021 budget. See last week’s fact.
- There is a general election in the 2024 year which could change Crown revenue, spending, and debt levels significantly.
- Net Core Crown Debt is the most commonly used economic indicator for government debt.
- We chose not to use the new debt metric that includes the NZSF (New Zealand Super Fund) and other amounts, due to:
- The controversy surrounding this change.
- Data tables from 2012-2023 only being available for the previous metric.
- The 2022 figure contains actuals to March 31st and then the Treasury forecast to June 30th.
- The 2023 forecast figure assumes net debt of $164 billion and GDP of $401 billion to get the 41% of GDP figure. These are forecast figures, so could change significantly.
- We’ve shown both $ and % values to help Kiwis better understand Crown/Government debt relative to GDP.
- Additional notes from Treasury can be found in the data source pages below.
- All numbers are provisional and subject to revision.
Thank you to the Factors who helped pull this together.
SOURCES:
https://www.treasury.govt.nz/sites/default/files/2022-05/befu22.pdf page 157.
https://www.treasury.govt.nz/system/files/2022-05/fsgnz-9mths-mar22.xlsx (for the actual figures to the end of March 2021).
Data published by The Treasury
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