[Analytical Perspectives]
[Other Technical Presentations]
[17. National Income and Product Accounts]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office, www.gpo.gov]


  The National Income and Product Accounts (NIPAs) are an integrated set 
of measures of aggregate U.S. economic activity that are prepared by the 
Department of Commerce. One of the many purposes of the NIPAs is to 
measure the Nation's total current production of goods and services, 
known as gross domestic product (GDP), and the incomes generated in its 
production. Because the NIPAs are widely used in economic analysis, it 
is important to show the NIPA presentation of Federal transactions, 
which differ somewhat from the basis used for other budget 
presentations. This section normally shows the NIPA presentation of 
Federal transactions, but due to disruptions associated with the partial 
shut-down of Government operations resulting from the budget impasse, it 
is not included in the budget this year. The Department of Commerce 
plans to publish the presentation in a forthcoming issue of its Survey 
of Current Business, and the presentation should be restored in next 
year's budget.
  The Department of Commerce undertook a comprehensive revision of the 
NIPAs during the past year. The first stage in the release of the 
revisions was delayed by the partial Government shut-down. Because of 
that delay, and because historical NIPA data have to date only been 
revised for the period since 1958, the Historical Tables volume for this 
budget continues to use GDP and other NIPA data on the pre-revision 
basis, although GDP on the post-revision basis is shown in Chapter 1 of 
this volume. The primary change made in the comprehensive revisions was 
to recognize government expenditures for capital equipment and 
structures as investment. This entailed replacing government 
expenditures for equipment and structures with depreciation charges on 
past investments in computing the surplus or deficit of the government 
sector (State and local as well as Federal). This change in the NIPA 
presentation of government transactions is discussed in Chapter 6 of 
this volume, ``Federal Investment Spending and Capital Budgeting.''