Social capital and public expenditure in Australia.

The structure of developed economies has changed radically in recent decades. As late as the 1960s, it was reasonable to describe the economy in terms of three stages of production: primary production—of agricultural and mineral raw materials; secondary production—a manufacturing industry that transformed raw materials into items of final consumption; tertiary production—a sector that provided transport, distribution, retail, and financial services to the primary and secondary sectors. Services such as health and education did not fit into this model, but since they accounted for less than 20 per cent of employment, they were commonly regarded as a kind of ‘overhead cost’ for the economy as a whole.