Glossary:National accounts (NA)
National accounts, sometimes called macroeconomic accounts and abbreviated as NA, are statistics focusing on the structure and evolution of economies. They describe and analyse, in an accessible and reliable way, the economic interactions (transactions) within an economy. There are an almost unimaginable large number of these transactions.
All institutional units operating within an economy can be assigned to a particular institutional sector. Breakdowns by institutional sector are given by the sector accounts.
Macroeconomic developments, such as economic growth and inflation, are driven by the actions of the individual economic subjects in an economy. Grouping economic subjects with similar behaviour into institutional sectors helps significantly in understanding the functioning of the economy.