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6. SPECIAL ARTICLES

6.1 Household expenditure on IT goods and services (unpublished data from the ABS Household Expenditure Survey)

In June 2000, the ABS released the first results from the 1998-99 Household Expenditure Survey (1998-99 Household Expenditure Survey, Australia: Summary of Results, ABS Catalogue no. 6530.0). Although the survey collected expenditure on computer-related goods and services, these data were not reported separately in this publication. The present article presents that information.

Over the 12 months to June 1999, Australian households spent an average of $284 on information technology goods and services. Households in the Northern Territory and Australian Capital Territory spent considerably more than the States, with an average of $542 and $502 respectively. For the States, the average amounts spent were Victoria $325, Western Australia $272, South Australia $266, Queensland $264, New South Wales $259 and Tasmania $244.

	$
Average Weekly Household Expenditure
Home computer equipment (including pre-packaged computer software)	3.98
TV games and computer software	1.08
Blank computer media	0.11
On-line charges (Internet)	0.28
Household expenditure on information technology goods and services	5.45
Total household expenditure on recreation	88.81

• Data processing services (7831),

• Information storage and retrieval services (7832),

• Computer maintenance services (7833),

• Computer consultancy services (7834).

• Data processing services - an increase of 1.8% (due to wage increases),

• Information storage and retrieval services - a decrease of 4.9% (due to productivity savings).

	Computer services 783	Data processing services 7831	Information storage & retrieval services 7832	Computer maintenance services 7833	Computer consultancy services 7834
1997-98	na	98.0	na	na	na
1998-99	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0	100.0
1997
March	na	na	na	na	na
June	na	96.6	na	na	na
September	na	97.4	na	na	na
December	na	97.5	97.8	na	na
1998
March	na	97.8	97.8	na	na
June	na	99.3	98.2	na	na
September	97.1	99.7	98.3	99.2	96.4
December	97.8	99.1	100.0	99.8	97.3
1999
March	99.1	99.0	100.4	100.5	98.9
June	106.1	102.3	101.3	100.6	107.5
September	106.4	103.8	101.0	100.5	107.7
December	108.2	104.9	100.4	100.7	109.9
2000
March	108.6	105.2	100.0	100.7	110.4
June	108.7	107.1	95.1	100.7	110.5