Question

What are the NIPAs? Who collects the data? Where do you go to get it? What can you do with it? How good is it? Get some data and put the current state of the economy into perspective with some actual measures of activity. To start, find the most recent information on the major economic components... GDP, C, I, G, and NX (note that NX=X-M exports - imports) and see how they have been changing over the last few periods. Be sure to differentiate between real and nominal measures and use real values in your discussion. Also discuss the expenditure versus the income approach to determining GDP, use some of the material from econport for this and remember a dollar of spending by someone is always a dollar of income received by someone else. Develop a graph of real GDP over the most recent 12 quarters you can find (four quarters of three months each are in in a calendar year).

Answer 1

Solution: There are multiple parts to this question, hence we will be solving first four parts.

What are the NIPAs?

The national income and product accounts (NIPA) are part of the national accounts of the United States.

Who collects the data?

Bureau of Economic Analysis of the Department of Commerce collects the data.

Where do you go to get it?

Please use this link to get it:

https://www.bea.gov/

https://www.bea.gov/national/sna-and-nipas

What can you do with it?

We can get information about general economic activity (inflation, employment, GDP etc.) from this.