Economy of Sydney

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Sydney's central business district is Australia's largest financial and business services hub.
Median weekly household incomes by postal area in the 2011 census, red indicates high incomes, purple indicates low incomes. The North Shore and areas fronting Sydney Harbour tend to be more affluent, while the south is generally middle class and west is predominantly working class.

The economy of Sydney is notable for its importance in the areas of trading, manufacturing, finance, education, and distribution in Australia. Sydney has the largest economy in Australia.

Sydney's CBD is the largest in Australia and also has plenty of surrounding commercial areas which are considered part of Sydney. A notable one is Parramatta, which is bigger than some state capitals.[citation needed]

Sydney city extends over the harbour bridge, forming North Sydney, a continuation of the CBD. North Sydney has a large economy; however it tends to have a high vacancy rate. Just a few kilometres north of Sydney's city centre, is Sydney's fourth largest commercial area, Chatswood. Chatswood's main economy is retail and is home to many highrise buildings, with its own recognisable skyline. 20th Century Fox has large Sydney studios.

History

Although the CBD dominated the city's business and cultural life in the early days, other business/cultural districts have developed in a radial pattern since World War II. In 1945, two-thirds of all jobs in Sydney were located in the City of Sydney and surrounding inner city municipalities, but post-war suburbanisation meant that only a quarter of the workforce were located in the city, South Sydney, Leichhardt and Marrickville municipalities.

With a boom in passenger railway construction came rapid extension of the suburbs along the railway corridors to the west and south, and eventually to the North Shore, after the completion of the Harbour Bridge allowed trains to continue from North Sydney into the CBD. This radial-spoke pattern of development changed after World War II, when increasing car ownership encouraged infill development where the railways didn't run, and then further expansion around the perimeter of the city. These outer areas have mostly missed out on further rail expansion and are primarily car dependent to this day.[1]

Financial centre

Sydney is a leading financial centre in the Asia-Pacific region.[2] It is home to the headquarters of the Australian Securities Exchange and the Reserve Bank of Australia. It also serves as the regional headquarters for numerous multinational corporations.

Banking industry

Of the 57 authorised deposit-taking banks with operations in Australia, 44 are based in Sydney

Tourism

Main article: Tourism in Sydney

Sydney received 8.2 million visitors in 2016, an 11.4 per cent increase from 2015. The main sources of Sydney's tourists were from north-east and south-east Asia.[3] The Vivid Sydney festival, held annually each winter, attracted 1.7 million visitors in 2015–it is the biggest festival in Australia and one of the biggest of its kind in the world.[4] The most visited landmark in the city is the Sydney Opera House, located at Bennelong Point, and is also the most visited landmark in Australia–the building received a $202 million renovation in 2017, known as the Renewal Project, and accommodates an average yearly audience of two million people.[5][6] Tourism in Sydney generates approximately $30 billion to the state (NSW) economy each year according to 2010 statistics.[7]

Manufacturing

Sydney is the largest manufacturing hub in Australia, with the value of the city's manufacturing industry surpassing $21 billion in 2012–13, overtaking that of Melbourne ($18.9 billion)–which was formerly Australia's manufacturing heartland.[8][9] Sydney's manufacturing sector consists largely of domestic-focused and high-tech manufacturing such as biotechnology, food processing and advanced electronics.[10] Major manufacturing companies with operations in Sydney include Arnott's, Coca-Cola Amatil, Arrium, Visy, Amcor and Rheem, among many others.

The Smithfield-Wetherill Park Industrial Estate in Greater Western Sydney is the largest industrial estate in the Southern Hemisphere and is the centre of manufacturing and distribution in the region. Lying between the major population growth zones in the north-west and south-west of Sydney, the estate contains more than 1,000 manufacturing, wholesale, transport and service firms which employ more than 20,000 persons.[11][12]

Housing

As of December 2019, Sydney has the highest median house price of any Australian capital city at $1,142,212.[13] According to The Economist Intelligence Unit's Worldwide cost of living survey, Sydney is the sixteenth most expensive city in the world.[14] According to a report published by the OECD in November 2005, Australia has the most overvalued houses in the Western world, with prices 52 percent higher than that justified by rental values.[15]

Since the 1980s Sydney's average capital growth has been growing 7.4% per year, which means that the average property prices doubled in value every decade.[16][17][18]

Employment

As of January 2022, Sydney's unemployment rate was reported as 4.8% in the 'East Metro' employment region,[19] 6.9% in the 'South West',[20] 5.9% in the 'Greater West',[21] and 4.1% in the 'North and West' region.[22]

See also

References

  1. ^ Spearitt, Peter, 2000, Sydney's Century: A History p. 122, Sydney: UNSW Press
  2. ^ Daly, M. T. and Pritchard, B. 2000. Sydney:Australia's financial and commercial capital. In J. Connell (Ed.). Sydney the emergence of a global city. pp 76-95. Oxford University Press ISBN 0-19-550748-7, pp 167-188
  3. ^ Hoh, Amanda (20 January 2017). "Sydney needs more hotels, cruise ports, jobs to support tourism, academic says". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 22 November 2017.
  4. ^ Boland, Michaela (28 May 2016). "Vivid Festival puts Sydney in light and attracts tourism dollars". The Australian. Retrieved 22 November 2017.
  5. ^ "Sydney icon's $202 million facelift gives greater access to all visitors". SBS. 11 August 2016. Retrieved 22 November 2017.
  6. ^ "Sydney Opera House: 40 fascinating facts". Telegraph.co.uk. 24 October 2013. Retrieved 22 November 2017.
  7. ^ "Tourism - City of Sydney". Retrieved 23 November 2017.
  8. ^ "Sydney takes manufacturing capital crown from Melbourne". The Sydney Morning Herald. 8 February 2014. Retrieved 4 April 2020.
  9. ^ Sydney overtakes Melbourne as Australia's biggest manufacturing centre - Australian Manufacturing
  10. ^ Matt Wade (8 February 2014). "Sydney takes manufacturing capital crown from Melbourne". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 11 December 2021.
  11. ^ Smithfield-Wetherill Park
  12. ^ Don't forget the Southern Hemisphere's Largest Industrial Zone by Marie Hogg and Simon Benson, Fairfield Advance, 13 November 2015
  13. ^ "Sydney's median house price back over $1 million as interest rate cut looms". The Sydney Morning Herald. 2 March 2020. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  14. ^ "Worldwide Cost of Living 2018" (PDF).
  15. ^ Boilling, M. 2 February 2006. City among most costly Archived 21 February 2006 at the Wayback Machine, Herald Sun
  16. ^ Abelson, Peter. "HOUSING PRICES IN AUSTRALIA: 1970 TO 2003" (PDF). econ.mq.edu.au. Archived from the original (PDF) on 28 December 2013. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
  17. ^ C. Delmendo, Lalaine (15 August 2019). "Australia's house prices are now in free fall". globalpropertyguide.com. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
  18. ^ Burke, Kate (28 December 2019). "Now and then: How Sydney's property market has changed since 2010". domain.com.au. Retrieved 8 April 2020.
  19. ^ "Explore the data in the Labour Market Information Portal". lmip.gov.au. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
  20. ^ "Welcome to the Labour Market Information Portal". lmip.gov.au. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
  21. ^ "Welcome to the Labour Market Information Portal". lmip.gov.au. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
  22. ^ "Welcome to the Labour Market Information Portal". lmip.gov.au. Retrieved 7 March 2022.
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