View the International Data Comparison Fact Sheet for July 2006.

Invest Australia’s International Data Comparison Fact Sheet, which provides an easy-to-read comparison of Australia’s performance and position across a range of key economic and investment related indicators, has been updated to include data effective to 12 July 2006 .

Points of interest include:

Time required to start up a business

According to the 2006 World Bank's Doing Business database it takes less time to set up a new business in Australia than anywhere else. While it takes a global average of 47 days to launch a commercial or industrial firm with up to 50 employees, it only takes two days in Australia to complete the overall process compared to the US (5 days), Singapore (6 days), Hong Kong (11 days), UK (18 days), Korea (22 days), China (48 days) and India (71 days).

Cost of Living

The cost of living in Australian cities for expatriate employees continues to be relatively low according to the 2006 Cost of Living Survey conducted by Mercer Human Resources Consulting.  This survey covers 144 cities across six continents with New York City used as the reference with a score of 100.

The Asia-Pacific region is home to eight of the world's twenty costliest cities, with Seoul in second place (up from 5^th place last year), Hong Kong in fourth place (up from 9^th place) and Singapore in seventeenth place (up from 34^th place). For companies, it is significantly less expensive to send employees to Sydney (index of 91.3), Melbourne (78.8), Perth (74.3), Brisbane (73.2), and Adelaide (70.6)   than other cities in the region such as Seoul (121.7), Tokyo (119.1), Hong Kong (116.3), Osaka (108.3), Beijing (94.9) and Singapore (92).

Office Rents and Occupancy Costs Worldwide

Survey results from CB Richard Ellis's 2006 Global Market Rents publication reveal that occupancy costs for prime office space in Australia remain globally competitive. (The following cost comparisons are in US$ cost per square foot per annum). Globally, London (West End) is the most expensive location with a total occupancy cost of $185.60 - more than four times dearer than Sydney. In the Asia-Pacific region, Australian cities such as Sydney (39.57), Brisbane (29.32), Perth (27.25), Melbourne (23.99), Canberra (23.98) and Adelaide (18.50) are more cost effective than Tokyo (Inner Central) (130.05), Hong Kong (101.67), Mumbai (93.06), Seoul (68.99), Shanghai (Pudong) (44.86), Singapore (41.53) and Taipei (40.34).

Other monthly economic and financial statistics, such as changes in central bank rates, consumer prices and unemployment rates, have also been updated.