Expenditures on Goods and Services
Expenditures on goods and services are defined as the values of the amounts that buyers pay, or agree to pay, to sellers in exchange for goods or services that sellers provide to them or to other institutional units designated by the buyers.
The buyer incurring the liability to pay need not be the same unit that takes possession of the good or service. As already noted, it is common for government units or NPISHs to pay for goods or services that the sellers provide to households. Moreover, as explained below, the liability incurred by the buyer does not necessarily have to be settled by a payment of cash.