Upper Hunter Economic Recovery Slowing Down

BY JARROD MELMETH

The Hunter Research Foundation held its Upper Hunter Economic breakfast this morning industry professionals discussed the regions economic indicators.

Economic indicators are used to analyse the economic performance of a region in order to indicate the direction of that economy.

According to the new analysis, the Upper Hunter business and household expectations for the local economy continued to decline from their 2017 high.

The lead economist for the Hunter Research Foundation Dr Anthea Bill said the Upper Hunter is in Sync with the Hunter region more broadly as well as the rest of the nation.

"The Upper Hunter region and the Hunter together, are showing some more robust signs, particularly in terms of their housing markets. We are seeing some declines but only moderately.

"At the moment when we have a look at the Upper Hunter, housing market and house prices declined by three per cent overall, but when we unpack that, we can see most of those declines were driven by the Upper Hunter Shire. Muswellbrook and Singleton actually had a two per cent rebound and Singleton had particularly strong growth over the year of seven per cent in its house prices.

"There was less softening in the consumer sector for both the Hunter and the Upper Hunter, while business measures are kind of tracking in sync in some ways with the nation. We have had a bit of a softening in the business sector. Some slowing of the moment that was seen in 2017-18.

"I think political uncertainty at a national level is playing in. There has been some downgrading of global forecasts and there might be a little bit extra impact in the region around some softening in the thermal coal price that we will be watching for future economic indicators," Dr Bill said.

The key economic indicators for the Upper Hunter are:

• Employment: fell despite growth in September 2018. The Unemployment rate is steady, just above the state but below the broader Hunter region.

• Median house prices: across the Upper Hunter fell by 3 per cent. There was a significant decline in the Upper Hunter Local Government Area, but growth in Singleton and Muswellbrook.

• Business performance and confidence: soften further from a recovery in late 2017, when the region was at its peak but remains above long-term averages.

• Household spending: past spending has stayed relatively steady while future household finances showed a decline.

• Business and household confidence: the region's economy has softened again, but businesses and households remain optimistic, and confidence is well above 2013-15 lows.

Economic indicators for the Upper Hunter.

A mixed bag for the Hunter economy

BY JESSICA ROUSE

The latest economic snapshot for the region has been released by the Hunter Research Foundation Centre.

It's a mixed bag, with the June quarter bringing subdued income growth and consumption, improved business confidence despite a decline in household confidence and a fall in the unemployment rate.

Lead Economist DR Anthea Bill says the state of the region's unemployment and employment rates are quite positive.

"The Hunter economy added 4,500 jobs and that was a growth of 1.4 per cent so that's in line with the state and a lot of those new jobs that were added to the economy were full-time jobs and growth was strongest in males and over the quarter male part-time employment actually contracted."

It's good news for first home buyers, but not so good for home owners - there's been a 2 per cent decline in Lake Macquarie and a 5 per cent drop largely in Dungog, Port Stephens and Singleton.

"The median house price across the Hunter declined in the June quarters of 2.4 per cent decline so that's the first time we've had a negative quarterly growth in median house price since September 2015 and that's led to a slowing of the annual growth rate to 6 per cent," said DR Anthea Bill.

However, while there are a few positives, DR Anthea Bill says apprenticeships for young people have been on a steady downward trend since 2012 with a 24 per cent decline.

"I understand there was some removal of employer incentives around that time period and there have also been overall shifts in employment away from manufacturing which has been a very strong provider of apprenticeships and traineeships in the region. I heard commentary also around the wage rate for apprentices and trainees."

Latest snapshot of the Hunter economy

BY JESSICA ROUSE

The Hunter Reseach Foundation has released its latest snapshot of the Hunter economy for the first quarter of 2017. It's been a positive first quarter with businesses being more innovative, house price growth continuing, and consumers saving more.

The latest research found that businesses are being more innovative. Around 46 per cent of the region's businesses have introduced new or improved products or services in the first quarter of this year which is the highest proportion since the foundation started collecting data in 2009.

"There was a sizeable jump in firms introducing new and improved products or services within their own industry or Australia although not so much in new to the world offerings. When we look at our data we can see that Hunter businesses who were innovating are also more likely to be profitable exporting overseas but also more likely to be employing more workers," said lead economist Dr Anthea Bill.

Retail figures were lower than expected with Hunter consumers spending less and saving more. In terms of personal finances, households' expectations are set to remain steady for the next 12 months. According to the research, low wages are mostly to blame for the reduction in spending. 

"Wage growth is at historically low levels so even though we've seen an improvement in the world economy, nationally we're not seeing much of a shift in consumption patterns and its sort of an ongoing weakness in the economy, so I think we need to see some improvement in wages to see an improvement in household spending patterns," said Dr Anthea Bill.

On the employment side of the economy, the research found there had been a 1 per cent fall in employment in the first quarter of this year, reversing the rise from the last quarter of 2016. Unemployment also rose to 5.5 per cent in March bringing it back in line with the state average.