The OECD Economic Outlook analyses the major economic trends over the coming 2 to 3 years. It provides in-depth coverage of the main economic issues and the policy measures required to foster growth in each member country. Forthcoming developments in major non-OECD economies are also evaluated in detail. Each edition of the Outlook provides a unique resource to keep abreast of world economic developments. The OECD Economic Outlook database is a comprehensive and consistent macroeconomic database of the OECD economies, covering expenditures, foreign trade, output, labour markets, interest and exchange rates, balance of payments, and government debt. For the non-OECD regions, foreign trade and current account series are available.

The database contains annual for the projection period. Variables are defined in such a way that they are as homogenous as possible for the countries covered. Breaks in underlying series are corrected as far as possible. Sources for the historical data are publications of national statistical agencies and OECD statistical publications such as the Quarterly National Accounts, the Annual National Accounts, the Labour Force Statistics and the Main Economic Indicators. The cut-off date for information used in the compilation of the projections was the 7 June 2017.

Concerning the aggregation of world trade, a new composition has been introduced, since projections are now made for the major non-OECD economies. Thus, besides OECD and the OECD euro area, the following new regions are available: Dynamic Asian Economies (Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam); Oil Producers (Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Brunei, Timor-Leste, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Ecuador, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, Algeria, Angola, Chad, Rep. of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Nigeria, Sudan); with the remaining countries in a residual 'Rest of the World' group.

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Annually

OECD projections are elaborated from seasonal and working-day-adjusted quarters for selected key variables, from which annual data are derived. This implies that differences between adjusted and unadjusted annual data may occur, though these in general are quite small. In some countries, official forecasts of annual figures do not include working-day adjustments. Even when official forecasts do adjust for working days, the size of the adjustment may in some cases differ from that used by the OECD.

The cut-off date for information used in the compilation of the projections is 18 May 2016. As such it is a snapshot of the position at that time, and data may be revised subsequently by countries. Moreover, some discrepancies between annual data from OECD ‘Annual National Accounts’ and OECD ‘Quarterly National Accounts’ can also be observed due to updating time lag of the different datasets.

Annual

Data are reported over 1960-2018. Last historical points at the 16 May 2017. Data after this date are OECD forecasts.

With the OECD Economic Outlook 87, new aggregation techniques have been applied to construct the OECD area (34 countries) and the OECD euro area (15 OECD countries that are also members of Euro area). The new approach aims to better handle issues arising from evolving composition of these areas and different data availability across countries. The main changes are a switch from a fixed weighting scheme to moving weighting schemes for OECD and the direct aggregation of ratios, rather than computing them as ratios of aggregated components. Consequently, a number of series expressed in levels differ from the series previously published, while others are no longer available, particularly government and labour market data. Concerning the aggregation of world trade, a new composition has been introduced, since projections are now made for the major non-OECD economies. Thus, besides OECD and the OECD euro area, the following new regions are available: Dynamic Asian Economies (Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam); Oil Producers (Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Brunei, Timor-Leste, Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen, Ecuador, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, Algeria, Angola, Chad, Rep. of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Nigeria, Sudan); with the remaining countries in a residual Rest of the World group.