Saturday, January 09, 2010

GDP: friend or foe?

I attended the British Association for the Advancement of Science Conference in Birmingham in 1977, and even then economists were asking whether GDP was a useful measure. The example I remember was eating more sweets and consequently visiting the dentist more often.

Should we be quite so concerned about goosing GDP with quantitative easing etc, or is it just a trap to make us continue misallocating resources?

8 comments:

James Higham said...

Advancement of science eh? Does it need it?

AntiCitizenOne said...

Change in GDP - Change in Debt.

Sackerson said...

James - yes, or we'd still be hacking flints and shivering.

ACO - quite, wish the Treasury and BoE and FSA agreed. Though that doesn't address the sweets-and-dentist thing.

Paddington said...

Sackerson - if only we could get our leaders and the populace to understand what you said in your comment.

uni-talian said...

I didn't realise you were so old! ;-)

Sackerson said...

Inside, there is no age.

Paddington said...

"Sackerson said... Inside, there is no age."

Either Confucius, or the wrapper on a Twinkie (non-US residents look that up).

Sackerson said...

I categorically deny that I am a Twinkie.