Talk:Economy of Wales

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Contents 1 Expansion 2 smallest economy? 3 Airports? 4 Notes 5 43rd largest economy 6 Template Information Box 7 Requests for expansion 7.1 Utilities 7.2 The role of the public sector 7.3 Economic policy controversies

[edit] Expansion

• Economic history - a lot more can be said about the economic history of Wales.
• Regional variations - would be nice to have a table here showing a breakdown by principal area of GDP per capita.
• Black economy - maybe something can be said about the black economy, though by its very nature it is hard to quantify.

(Sloman 17:13, 19 November 2005 (UTC))

[edit] smallest economy?

I always believed that the Northern Irish economy was smaller then the Welsh? Many articles on Wikipedia seem to suggest this. Grunners 17:10, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Have a look at the league table on Economy of the United Kingdom#Regional variation, it puts Wales slightly behind Northern Ireland. I got the figure from outside sources but this article seems to back it up that Wales is the Smallest Economy (in terms of GDP in 2002). Which articles on Wikipedia suggest Northern Irish economy is smaller? Is it by the same measure (GDP)? The Northern Irish economy might be smaller by other measures - I don't know but I did state "by GDP in 2002" in the article. Did the other articles cite any figures, measures or sources? (Sloman 12:19, 27 November 2005 (UTC))

Northern Ireland requires more cash input than the other three, and I'll check some sources but I'd always read that NI was behind Wales, especially in recent times Grunners 02:18, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Here's the link > Economy of Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland economy is the smallest of the four economies making up the United Kingdom.

I think the article Economy of Northern Ireland could do with naming its sources and quote some figures. I am not saying that it is wrong, but stating figures from reputable sources would give it more credibility. To be honest, I'm not that interested in Northern Ireland but if you want to do some more research on this, I think the office for national

statistics ONS Website would be a good place to start finding some facts and figures on this. Also, the fact that Northern Ireland requires more cash input does not necessarily mean that it has a smaller economy. (Sloman 23:47, 15 December 2005 (UTC))

Sloman, there's no way the NI economy could be bigger than that of Wales. The NI population is only about half that of the Welsh, and NI is around the same level on indicators like GDP per head. All the stats are over at www.statistics.gov.uk, though you have to do some digging. I'll do the update. --Pondle 11:12, 7 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Airports?

The 'Transport Infrastructure' section suggests that there is only one airport in Wales offering scheduled flights, I don't think that is true. Im pretty sure that swansea offers scheduled flights too. Can someone check this? (unsigned comment from User:86.135.45.1)

Swansea Airport used to have flights, but it's true that there are currently no scheduled passenger flights from it. Air Wales used to do Swansea->Cardiff->London City (woo, international! :)) and possibly others I forget, but the Swansea bit was never profitable and they dropped the Swansea bit. It's now looking as though the Cardiff part wasn't too good either: they're dropping their passenger flights from Cardiff (although they hope other carriers will take them over).

There has been some suggestion of linking north and south Wales via air (with Swansea, Cardiff and RAF Valley the likely destinations), too, but it's not happened. At the start of the year, the link was hoped to be by the end of 2004; at the end of 2004 they were suggesting by the end of 2006. Check back in December :)

Telsa (talk) 14:40, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Notes

• The British Pound Sterling is the official currency of Wales
• The central bank of the United Kingdom, where interest rates are set and monetry policy is carried out, is the Bank of England in London.

[edit] 43rd largest economy

43rd Worlds largest economy? Where is this from? I have been searching for the origion of this but as yet have not found it.Drachenfyre 04:59, 26 December 2006 (UTC) Here is a link discussing the GVA for Wales http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/3166773.stm Drachenfyre 06:22, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

As a civil servant, I got this data from an internal report. I'll try and dig this up for you. However, this info is more than a year old now, so it might be best just to remove the sentence until I can find a more up to date report. (Sloman 09:25, 26 December 2006 (UTC))

Sloman this would be fantastic if you can retreive it and it be official. I had made it a link on the official Wales page, so had to remove because it was out of context. Even if a year old it would be acceptable to post if it is from a reliable source, and no further information has come out. Because I could not verify the statement elsewhere, I was beginning to think it would be "if" Wales was independent it would be the 43rd largest economy, but even then the statement is in error when one takes the average GVA for the UK and then divide that by the Assembly target of 80%, that would place the goal of GVA at about just under 25k a year, and wedge it somewhere between Greece and Hong Kong of Wales were an independent nation. I look forward to more information on the subject! 64.134.101.98 10:19, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Sloman: In reference to Wales as the 43rd largest, on CNN recently they describe California has having the worlds 4th largest economy, so I do think there is some kind of measurement that validates this and your own source for Wales, but we need to find the precise sources. The inference that California has the 4th largest economy was not qualified in the broadcast in relation to the others, but it is safe to assume that it was comparing Cali to the U.S. as a whole and other economic groupings. I will continue to look in on the issue, if you could continue to look for your reference too. Drachenfyre 03:25, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Still looking for a public report (Sloman 18:30, 4 January 2007 (UTC))

We did some 'back of the envelope' calculations last year and we thought that if Wales was an independent country it would be somewhere around the 52nd largest economy in the world:

50. Nigeria - GDP = $72,106m 51. U.A.E. - GDP = $70,960m 52. Wales - GDP = $68,495m

We got the international data from the World Bank website (http://siteresources.worldbank.org/DATASTATISTICS/Resources/GDP.pdf) - at the time its figures were for 2005 - and the Welsh data from National Statistics - at the time the data referred to 2004. The ONS data is in pounds sterling and World Bank information is in dollars, so we used one of the online currency converters.Pondle 18:17, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Template Information Box

Might someone work on creating a nifty information box simular to the Economy of Ireland page? I think it would help add something special here too. Drachenfyre 14:37, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requests for expansion

[edit] Utilities

I think it would be worth having a small note about things like power generation capacity and water supply here. I'll see what I can find.

[edit] The role of the public sector

It would informative to have some information about what role the various tiers of government play in the Welsh Economy. The tiers of government may include: Local authorities (the unitary authorities); the Welsh Assembly Government and National Assembly for Wales; the UK government; possibly the European Union; and maybe something about public bodies like the DVLA &c. (Sloman 12:48, 18 February 2007 (UTC))

[edit] Economic policy controversies

In addition to introducing the role of the Welsh Assembly and U.K. government policies, it would be useful to add economic policy controversies. Drachenfyre 09:00, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Very nice inclusion to the artical! Looks very nice! Drachenfyre 04:52, 5 March 2007 (UTC)