Definition: OECD dollar

Category: Purchasing power parities

The artificial currency unit in which the PPPs (Purchasing power parities) and real expenditures for the OECD are expressed – namely, US dollars at average OECD price levels. US dollars at average OECD price levels are US dollars that have the same purchasing power over the whole of the OECD. Their purchasing power is a weighted average of the purchasing power of the national currencies of OECD Member Countries. As such they reflect the average price level in the OECD or, more precisely, the weighted average of the price levels of OECD Member Countries. OECD dollars are defined by equating the total real expenditure of the OECD on a specific basic heading, aggregation level or analytical category to the total nominal expenditure of the OECD on the same basic heading, aggregation level or analytical category (2012 Methodological manual on purchasing power parities).

The name given by users to the artificial currency unit in which the PPPs and real final expenditures for the OECD 30 are expressed – namely, "US dollars at average OECD price levels". "US dollars at average OECD price levels" are US dollars that have the same purchasing power over the whole of the OECD 30. Their purchasing power is a weighted average of the purchasing power of the national currencies of OECD Member Countries. As such they reflect the average price level in the OECD 30 or, more precisely, the weighted average of the price levels of Member Countries. "US dollars at average OECD price levels" or "OECD dollars" are defined by equating the total real final expenditure of the OECD 30 on a specific basic heading, aggregate or analytical category to the total nominal final expenditure of the OECD 30 on the same basic heading, aggregate or analytical category (2005 Methodological manual on purchasing power parities). http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/product?code=KS-RA-12-023&mode=view Eurostat and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), "Eurostat - OECD Methodological manual on purchasing power parities (2005 Edition)", Methods and Nomenclatures, Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Luxembourg, 2006European Union, Regulation (EC) No 1445/2007 establishing rules for the provision of basic information on PPPs, Official Journal of the European Union No L 336, 20.12.2007, p. 1 - 24