The great merit of Mr Graeme Snooks' monograph on the depression in Western Australia is that it is based on solid empirical foundations. Following Professor N. G. Butlin's methodology, estimates of gross product and capital formation (including components) have been constructed for Western Australia from 1923-4 to 1938-9. This is a rare example of regional income estimates, and builds on the pioneer work of Alex Kerr. Snooks has had the benefit of the criticism of Butlin's estimation procedures by Boehm, Lydall and others, and his work appears to be as authoritative as the sources permit. Fairly detailed comparison is therefore possible between national and Western Australian economic experience in the inter-war period.
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This book is based on a master's thesis completed in 1968, undoubtedly one of the outstanding theses to be submitted for the degree in the field of economic history . . .

-- C. B. Schedvin, Australian Economic History Review, vol. 16, no. 2, September 1976 pp. 157-8.

This short survey of a single Australian state during the depression decade is based largely upon official publications, supplemented by business records, chiefly from the pastoral industry. It examines the four main areas of economic activity: agriculture; the pastoral and dairying industries; mining; and construction and manufacturing; and discusses the public sector also. A linking chapter attempts to connect the main sectors and to outline the process of recovery. It provides in a lengthy appendix estimates of Western Australia's domestic product and capital formation. Many of the series presented in the appendix are familiar in that they have been taken directly from, or modelled upon, Noel Butlin's larger work on the Australian economy as a whole. The work contains much of interest and importance. It clearly demonstrates the dependence of the Western Australian economy upon the primary sector, the impact of falling world demand for wheat and wool, and the compensatory expansion of gold mining with the rise in the price of gold.
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It is . . . an interesting and useful adjunct to the growing volume of depression literature.

-- Kevin Burley, Journal of Economic History, vol. 36, no. 2, June 1976 pp. 510-11.