Development: Time to Leave GDP Behind

[kristopher]

Development: Time to Leave GDP Behind
Posted on January 17, 2014
Nature

By Robert Costanza, Ida Kubiszewski, Enrico Giovannini, Hunter Lovins, Jacqueline McGlade, Kate E. Pickett, Kristín Vala Ragnarsdóttir, Debra Roberts, Roberto De Vogli& Richard Wilkinson


illustration by Pete Ellis/Drawgood.com

Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success. Countries should act now to embrace new metrics, urge Robert Costanza and colleagues.
GDP measures mainly market transactions. It ignores social costs, environmental impacts and income inequality. If a business used GDP-style accounting, it would aim to maximize gross revenue — even at the expense of profitability, efficiency, sustainability or flexibility. That is hardly smart or sustainable (think Enron). Yet since the end of the Second World War, promoting GDP growth has remained the primary national policy goal in almost every country1.

Meanwhile, researchers have become much better at measuring what actually does make life worthwhile. The environmental and social effects of GDP growth can be estimated, as can the effects of income inequality2. The psychology of human well-being can now be surveyed comprehensively and quantitatively3, 4. A plethora of experiments has produced alternative measures of progress (see Supplementary Information).

The chance to dethrone GDP is now in sight. By 2015, the UN is scheduled to announce the Sustainable Development Goals, a set of international objectives to improve global well-being. Developing integrated measures of progress attached to these goals offers the global community the opportunity to define what sustainable well-being means, how to measure it and how to achieve it. Missing this opportunity would condone growing inequality and the continued destruction of the natural capital on which all life on the planet depends.

Dethroning GDP

When GDP was instituted seven decades ago, it was a relevant signpost of progress...

More at: http://natcapsolutions.org/2014/01/17/development-time-to-leave-gdp-behind/#more-4020

[DontTreadOnMe]

1. Just as the Unemployment Reports... not based on facts

gee... unemployment is down this month. Really?

[kristopher]

2. GDP is based on facts, perhaps you could reread the article.

The first point is that the data (facts) being considered are only a small slice of the data that we SHOULD be looking at if we wish to make balanced decisions.

The second (and very important point) is that there is a process to propel this alternative approach to measuring "success" now in the development stage at the UN. You should be aware of this. If you are interested in positive change, you might want to consider supporting it by letting others know about it and what it means.

[DontTreadOnMe]

4. "only a small slice of the data"

is eliminating some of the data, eliminating some of the "facts"?

My point is the GDP Report does not tell the entire story, just as the Unemployment Reports.

[1StrongBlackMan]

3. Posted to for more depth reading.

[Lodestar]

5. Holistic measures reflect a change in values on all levels and this is the change that is being born

And of course those who have benefited from the old system have a death grip on it.