The Size of Australia’s Co-operative and Mutual Sector1 Morris Altman Newcastle Business School University of Newcastle, Australia Email:
[email protected] 1 This study was commissioned by the Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals, Australia. I thank Melina Morrison, CEO of the BCCM, for her support, comments and suggestions, Duncan Wallace and Chris Mason of the BCCM for their research assistance and Louise Lamontagne and Hannah Altman for their comments and suggestions. This paper was funded by the Business Council of Co-operatives and Mutuals. Table 1 The Size of Australia’s GDP Construction for Australia’s Co-operative and Mutual sector Co-operative and Mutual sector constant 2016 AUD Value added for co-ops for which we have data 137,660,614,307 In this paper, we estimate the size of the co-operative and mutual sector in Australia relative to the Australian Gross Domestic Product (GDP), as well as employment for 2016. To estimate output, we Value added for co-ops for which we have no data (small firms 2,238,453,751 adopt a value added methodology to avoid double-counting. As with all output and employment Total co-op value added (GDP) 139,899,068,058 estimates we adopt specific assumptions to generate our estimates. Using robust assumptions to generate economic estimates is common and not specific to the construction of estimates for the Total co-op GDP as % of Australia GDP (2016) 8.3% co-operative and mutual sector. Current estimates of the size of Australia’s co-operative and mutual sector are based on turnover or total revenue, which greatly exaggerates the size of this sector.