David Kalisch (economist)
| David Kalisch | |
|---|---|
| 15th Australian Statistician | |
|
Assumed office 15 December 2014 |
|
| Preceded by | Brian Pink |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
David Wayne Kalisch 9 August 1960 Adelaide, South Australia |
| Nationality | Australian |
| Alma mater | University of Adelaide |
| Occupation | Public servant |
| Profession | Economist |
David Wayne Kalisch (born 9 August 1960) is an Australian economist and public servant. He is the current Australian Statistician in charge of the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Kalisch was born in Adelaide, South Australia, and was educated at Brighton High School before studying for a Bachelor of Economics degree at the University of Adelaide.
Kalisch joined the Australian Public Service in 1982, holding various positions including senior executive roles from 1991. In 2006, he was appointed Deputy Secretary of the Department of Health and Ageing. From 2009 to 2010, he served as a commissioner on the Productivity Commission. In 2010, he was appointed as chief executive officer of the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, a statutory agency responsible for gathering statistics on health and welfare in Australia.
In December 2014, Kalisch was appointed as the Australian Statistician, the senior bureaucrat in charge of the national statistics agency, the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The position had been vacant for nearly a year when Kalisch's appointment was confirmed by Treasurer Joe Hockey.
In February 2015, Kalisch spoke to The Australian newspaper, where he stated that the ABS needed more funding to upgrade its computer systems and software. While lobbying the federal government for the funds, he also outlined the possibility of charging businesses for statistical data, and developing data linkages between the census or social statistical surveys, and government data such as benefits, Medicare and taxation records. In December 2015, the ABS announced it would be retaining names and addresses from the census indefinitely "for the purpose of richer and more-dynamic statistics". Former Australian Statistician Bill McLennan called the decision "the most significant invasion of privacy ever perpetrated on Australians by the ABS", and questioned the legality of enforcing name collection. Kalisch wrote an opinion column in Fairfax newspapers, saying he had made the decision to enable to ABS to produce better statistics on economic and social outcomes.
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