Yes indeed we need to measure things better. The thing that we most need to measure is the opportunity cost of Government intervention. Regulation soaks up time of the regulated people; it forces costs to grow for no benefit, divertign resources from adding value to destroying value.

The force for destruction of Government regulation is appallingly huge and impossible to measure. The value of choices not taken is always imaginary.

Now when we look at the article above, we find a cacophony of dim leftist ideas. We used to think we had to trade equality for growth? Bollocks. Only Marxists though that and they are responsible for 120 million dead in the last 100 years. Seek out their ideas and ignore them.

Inequality is the direct result of any human action. Manufacturing a pants-wetting moral outrage because an individual earns more than another is a destructive side-track. We should shun and deride these stupid ideas.

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=6365&page=59

<<..The second major/roadblock you have is this concept
that GDP is somehow used as a forecasting tool...It is not...It cannot be.>>

http://www.google.com.au/search?q=GDP+is+a+measurement+tool+&

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Measuring_GDP

GDP is designed*to measure/the market value..
[of production/that flows through..?]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_domestic_product
in 1944,
GDP became the main tool for measuring a country's economy.
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/Global/international/publications/RioPlus20/Beyond-GDP.pdf

Ahead of Rio+20, the need to (finally) go beyond GDP
has grown stronger.

This was also acknowledged in
the “zero draft” negotiation document,
which in January 2012 claimed to “recognise the limitations of GDP as
a measure of well-being” and suggested to “develop and strengthen indicators complementing GDP that/integrate economic, social and environmental dimensions in a balanced manner”.

New ways of measuring progress and wealth could mean true progress for sustainability, because what we\measure affects what we do, and if our measurements are flawed, decisions get distorted.

GDP was never meant to be a measure of well-being or development. It’s an indicator that grows by the\number of car crashes, purchase of private guns, funerals, loss of primary forests, overfishing, and so forth. It\also doesn’t account for the impacts our current choices will have in the future, which is a key question for
sustainability.

Yet, a myopic focus on GDP growth has been –
and still remains – at the core of what human
development is perceived to be by political leaders.

The criticism of GDP is as old as the tool itself,
but the economic crisis – coupled with looming resource
scarcity and multiple environmental challenges – has created new momentum for adopting better\measurement tools and going “beyond GDP”, a slogan frequently used today even by the World Bank.

The/UN, OECD, UNEP and others are all developing and testing different measuring tools.

<<>.Put together, these demonstrate clearly that you are unable to grasp the simple fact that GDP is a measurement tool of the general prosperity of our nation. >>

LOL

<<..Higher is therefore better>>

HIGH ROLLING
double up till ya win

lets talk of special drawing rights/
[the unspoken/new world currency*]
sdr/armogeddon...2hour/mark
http://rss.infowars.com/20140707_Mon_Alex.mp3

lesT we forget/the secreT bailouts/
too bIg to fail/ONLY got bigger/DEFAULTS.
EV3N BY RIGGING EVERY ASPECT/OF FREE*MARKETeerING

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/05/enron-2-0-wall-street-wants-manipulate-state-energy-markets-just-like-manipulates-every-market.html

Great article Allison.

GPD and per-capita GDP are terribly simplistic indicators, and yet they are practically worshipped by our silly politicians and their economic advisors.

You can see why – because it plays directly into the hands of the big business fraternity, which has a vested interest in pushing for ever-more growth and hence an ever-larger GDP. You know – the same big biz fraternity that gives big donations to political parties and has enormous sway over the whole political process.

And to this end, they have a vested interest in making GDP seem as good as they possibly can, by including in it all manner of economic activity which simply doesn’t advance prosperity and hence shouldn’t be included.

Stuff like economic activity due to the recovery effort after cyclones and floods, and which is due to road accidents and illness, and which is due to the duplication of basic services and infrastructure for the ever-rapidly-growing population. All of this is neutral, and should NOT be included in GDP, which makes it all out to be positive economic growth that is advancing our national prosperity!

As a result of this highly dodgy GDP measure, per-capita GDP is also highly dodgy. It is constantly increasing, suggesting that our very rapid rate of population growth is good for us.

But if GDP didn’t take into account all the neutral economic activity, and did take into account the reducing stock of our non-renewable and potentially renewable resources, and the ever-increasing rate of draw-down on them, plus a whole bunch of other real-world things, then there is no way that we would be seeing a progressively increasing per-capita GDP.

We do indeed need a much more realistic main economic indicator, and we need to take much more heed of a bunch of other indicators, which either don’t exist at all right now, or are treated far too lightly by our pollies and their ‘pseudoeconomist’ buddies.

The actual measure of a nation's worth, is the way it treats the most vulnerable.
And given the so called Christians taking leading roles, (Rudd, Abbott)another similar factor enters the equation.
Insomuch as you treat the least among you, you also treat me, sayeth the Lord!
Stiglitz uses tiny resource poor Norway, as his ideal example, as how to run an economy for the nation and not just as a cold mindless exercise. The economy and the government should serve the people, not visa versa!
They had a once only boost in their finances, due to North sea oil, and simply used it, to build a huge sovereign fund, that already is serving that nation, even as it grows larger.
And he measures their progress on a general happiness index, rather than the GNP.
We could do so much better by giving our available welfare to those who need it, rather than the already well off, who don't.
The first effect of improved welfare/poverty reduction, would be increased discretionary spending.
Which would result in increased business, increased inventory holdings, and increased manufacture, which would benefit us all.
As the mining boom starts to go backward, as seems to be happening now, we should be rolling out increased housing stocks, which would replace the mining projects no longer growing our economy.
This would require us to kill of some sacred cows, like negative gearing, which has done just the opposite, to predictions, by some so called economists/property developers/real estate kings?
We also need to embrace huge tax reform, that no longer allows avoiders to avoid.
Which as policy, would also be expansionary!
It's time to explore new options and new ideas!
I mean, repeating the mistakes of the past, or just not learning the lessons of history, is simply not an option, neither is continuing the fire sale of our economic sovereignty!
We need to remain cognizant of what really crueled the Celtic tiger and Spain's once burgeoning economies; namely, foreign speculation in the domestic property market! No ifs, buts or maybes!
Rhrosty.

Dear Rhosty,you need to put a bandage on your foot. Norway is not resource poor. It is actually oil rich, and has a trust fund which it uses to fund its social welfare expenditures. I didn't read anything after that I'm afraid. Such an egregious mistake didn't bode well for the rest.

I would agree with the author and with Stiglitz regards GDP.

Attempts to continually increase GDP (which is misnamed as “growth”) can easily lead a country over a cliff.

There is the Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) that some countries have now included in their National Accounts.

I don’t know if this figure is being prepared in Australia anymore, although it was some years ago, and it seemed to indicate Australia peaked sometime in the 1970’s to 1980’s.

Various amounts of anecdotal evidence would also indicate this to be true, and Australia has actually been in decline over the last 30 to 40 years.

Governments such as ours keep spruiking GDP, and also the Human Development Indix (HDI).

Australia does well in HDI, but a look at this graph shows we achieve a high HDI by consuming our natural resources, and our ecological footprint is now one of the worst in the world.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_footprint#mediaviewer/File:Human_welfare_and_ecological_footprint.jpg

But wait, there are countries that have nearly the same HDI as ours, but have almost half our ecological footprint.

If I was objective, (which I try to be), I would immediately deduce that Australia is being wasteful of its natural resources, and will often chew up its natural resources for little or no gain.

So if we just continue with GDP and other figures such as the HDI, we can become so wasteful of our resources we will eventually become very impoverished.

Ironic, but a very sad place to be.

LETS HOPE MUNDEEN GETS A WAKE-UP CALL

it seems warren mundine has invented the mundane index
ie hes going to present his thought bubble/at g20\to some sectarie

as i understand it[he said at some israel/aussie thing today
THE PLAN iS TO RATE [PEOPLE/OR THINGS?]/FROM TRIPLE A/TO TRIPPLE Z

I REALLY Am WORRIED/SO MUCH BETTER STUFF MUaNDANE COULD SPEAK OF
aND\HES GOING TO RATE BLAckfellas 86 different ways

[[excluding the abo/and the dvo]

talk about discrimination

anyhow all the best to te tripple ass
from a tripe u..working on beciming an imf
or a bmw..or an rsvp/pss..

this g 20
do i THE BSA/..need do a chogm/yet again
to try to cause the spovereign people to introduce the forein exchang
[eie the wikiseed/wikigeld/the first peoples money*[based on the promise to pay of seed [living seed]\seed from the tree of life/our own money sytm/we dont ned whitefella way/we do it abo way

[abo=alpha/beta-origonal[way\]
from the ground up/not top down/you bank a dollar and get credIT FOR TWO
BANK TEN BILLION GET CREDIT FOR 20 BILLION
we have half upfront/you have twice the spend
and its intrest free/put in more get double back[the johan*nine~trible index]

we will restore all that destroyed by war/globally finance our own rebuilding[we are all decendant from our ancestors[we are al abo/abo=the mean.warren*

the mindane mean
avo/and below/we are watching you/for posable threat

who knows
what else we got
the happyness index[you should hear te happy ghould ripping souls to sheds
yes happy ness/but also/safety/but not to the point of sic

Well Allison has certainly got the economic illiterates onside.

"Measure the real value of things."

What is that supposed to mean?

Of course the translation of this leftist-speak is "force my values onto everyone who doesn't agree with me."

Interestingly enough Allison doesn't even propose any alternative set of values.The only thing she contends for is that values should not be based on agreement (markets) and should be based on unprovoked aggression (policy); without any reason given for thinking this would be ethically or pragmatically better.

Allison, value always means (one or more persons) preferring one thing more than another. High value means very much preferred. Low value means not much or not preferred.

Value is subjective and for this reason, it can't be measured. In terms of numbers, value is always ordinal (1st, 2nd, 3rd), not cardinal (1, 2, 3). You can't get a kilogram of happiness, and you can't measure human satisfaction in any cardinal units.

Allison and Stiglitz, having confirmed and declared that the use of measurements to represent true human welfare or wellbeing is hopelessly inadequate, then say we need new and better "metrics". But what is a metric but another word for measurement? They have not begun to come to terms with the problem they have identified, and are only chasing their own tail.

And then because they are so dumb they can't understand what they are talking about, they just assume everyone else can't either!

Allison's is a plea for intellectual and v

Good post Incomiucardo.

<< Governments such as ours keep spruiking GDP >>

Yes, and in order to keep GDP growing, we keep the population growing, at a quite massive rate…. which of course is just completely self-defeating, as it is also growing the rate of demand for all resources, services and infrastructure, and reducing our ability to develop a sustainable society.

The worship of GDP and continuous growth is extremely bad news for our future.

jadine/quote..<<..Allison,..value always means/>>

VALUES AS PERCEIVED/BY THE EYE-OF/THE BEHOLDER
[IE/ITS/EMOTIONAL/PERSONAL/generalizations ensure general values
but specific's evolve specific values/LIKE A CALCULATOR/might bbe worth 50 bucks/but if it came with proof stiggie used it/it might be worth 55 bucks[to some]..or 200 to other/but the proving of the value/then finding te one/appreciating/its worth.

like the worth of jardines info

<<..preferring one thing/more than another....>>
for a reason/both for and against[like currently with rolf/harras/his art now is halved/but in time may rise/for the most unexpected reasoning

<<>>High value means very much preferred.>>
usually desired by many/but affordable to few
exclusivity/like the last bottle or grange/hermitpee

<<>.Low value means not much or not preferred.>>

I/LIVE-OUT/OF\RUBBISH-BINS
I PICKED UP 300 DOLLARS OF MEAT TONIGHT
yet it was out\of date/not off/yet it was thrown out
for me thats real value/but for you thats replulsive

<<>>Value is subjective..and for this reason,..it can't
be measured...In terms of numbers,..value is always ordinal>>

ordered/by degrees of preferences/meNtaly rating
<<>>(1st,2nd,3rd),>>

to there/i felt.i-was following.but

<<>.not cardinal(1,2,3).>>

that flummoxed-me.[i didnt/see its/value]

<<..You can't get/a kilogram\of happiness,>>
but/you get it\by the second/moment/minute/day
or/by incident/accident/or coincident..ie-[<<.by its relitive/measure]

<<..and you can't/measure human
satisfaction..in any cardinal units.>>

PLEASE/CLARIFY>?

<<.Allison and Stiglitz,\having confirmed/and declared..that the use of measurements../.to represent true human welfare..\..or wellbeing is hopelessly inadequate,..then[THEY]..say we need new..and better "metrics".>>

ME-TRICKS?
meta-indicies?
metronomic falicies?

<<.But what is a metric>>

good question

metric-,<<..but another word\for measurement?...>

<\They have not begun to come to terms with the problem they have identified,\and are only\chasing\their own tail.>>

And then because they are so dumb\they can't understand what they are talking about,\they just assume everyone else.\can't either!>>

EVERYTHING/HAS/BECOME..so..personalized
whats/the Stiglitz-theoRY\on\eco-theory

<<>>Allison's is a plea..for intellectual..>>

its all theory/they amit/to making it up
the fed reserve/has had 20 policies in 14 months

<<and v>

indicates/to ME/MUCH-MORE/TO\BE-SAID.

joe/my metrics study

A Metric can be considered as:[1]

* additive - the total cost of a path
is the sum* of the costs of individual links along the path,

* concave - the total cost of a path
is the minimum* of the costs of individual links along the path,

* multiplicative - the total cost of a path
is the product* of the costs of individual links along the path.

the metriC/NET-WORK
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metrics_(networking)

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/metric

Definition of METRIC
1
plural : a part of prosody that deals with metrical structure
2
: a standard of measurement <no metric exists that can be applied directly to happiness — Scientific Monthly>
3
: a mathematical function that associates a real nonnegative number analogous to distance with each pair of elements in a set such that the number is zero only if the two elements are identical, the number is the same regardless of the order in which the two elements are taken, and the number associated with one pair of elements plus that associated with one member of the pair and a third element is equal to or greater than the number associated with the other member of the pair and the third element
Examples of METRIC

1. <according to the usual metrics by which we judge fiction, this novel is an utter failure>

Origin of METRIC
Greek metrik&#275;, from feminine of metrikos in meter, by measure, from metron measure — more at measure
First Known Use: 1760
Related to METRIC

Synonyms
bar, barometer, benchmark, criterion, gold standard, grade, mark, measure, standard, par, touchstone, yardstick

Related Words
case, example, instance; average, norm, rule; acme, apex, meridian, peak, pinnacle, summit, zenith

Near Antonyms
aberration, abnormality, deviation

more
Other Mathematics and Statistics Terms
abscissa, denominator, divisor, equilateral,
exponent, hypotenuse, logarithm, oblique, radii, rhomb

Hello Ludwig

There can be “intensive” and “extensive” economic growth, where intensive growth mainly occurs due to increasing GDP per capita, and extensive growth mainly occurs due to population increase.

There is a serious difference between the two for our medium to long term future.

If any economist mentions economic growth, they should be stating whether they mean intensive or extensive growth.

Australia has achieved very little intensive growth, and GDP per capita has not risen substantially over the years, and in some quarters it actually decreases.

Most of Australia’s economic growth is due to extensive growth only, and as this article mentions, during 3.5 years Australia only achieved 0.53% increase in GDP per capita, which is almost negligable.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-03-14/bourke-mirage-economics/3889118

So most of our so-called growth is "extensive" growth only, while extensive growth is non-sustainable, as resources will inevitably run out.

And Australia is losing biocapacity at the rate of about 1% per year, and likely to hit “overshoot” between 2020 to 2030.

At that point Australia is living on borrowed time, and increasingly, as we will have to live on the resources of other countries.

My philosophy whenever my local MP mentions “growth”, I to write to them and ask them whether they mean “intensive” or “extensive” growth.

As yet, not one MP has ever had any idea of what I am talking about, which doesn’t bode well for Australia’s future.

Almost everything in this article is WRONG !
I have just read an article that I think anyone who is remotely
interested in this subject must read to find out what is really going on.

Gail Tverberg demolishes the conventional economists and their computer models.
She points out how the politicians are now making decisions on matters
that they just don't understand.
I now understand better where Wayne Swan went wrong and where
Joe Hockey is making a major mistake.
Also to increasing our ties to other economies will be a disastrous mistake.

It is a fairly long read but worth every minute it takes.
I would like to hear your comments on Gail's article.

Oh yes even Arjay will be interested as Gail has a shot at Christine Lagarde's
talking about numerology. It astonished her.

http://tinyurl.com/k9zqyfp

Bazz
I would agree with Gail Tverberg regards energy, but as well as energy resources such as oil and coal, I would extend it to cover many other natural resources.

For example, Japan has a high GDP, (which is good so far as many economists and politicians are concerned), but it is resource poor and has to rely on imports to survive.

Its biocapacity is small, and its ecological footprint is high, leading to a dependency on imports from other countries

“While having biocapacity of only 0.6gha per capita, Japan’s Ecological Footprint is 4.1gha per capita. This implies that Japan depends on imports to offset the gap.”

http://wwf.panda.org/who_we_are/wwf_offices/japan/?196151/Japan-Ecological-Footprint

So, in such a situation, a loss of an important import could damage Japan quite considerably, be it loss of oil, or loss of coal, or loss of wheat or other major food stuffs (and Japan even has to import fish and wood).

To ensure sustainability and ensure it can remain viable and independent, a country has to run with a constant biocapacity, and if possible an increasing biocapacity.

A country can never have a decreasing biocapacity, or it is in serious trouble.

Therefore, biocapacity figures would have to be a part of a country’s National Accounts, and economists and politicians should be talking about biocapacity whenever they mention GDP.

Incomunuicardo, thanks for the response.
The phrase biocapacity is new to me. At a guess I presume it means
amount of food and clothing generation needed from the available land area.
Australia's particular difficulty is that we are dependant on 95% and
soon to be 100% imported petrol and diesel.
A sudden loss of exports from the Middle East would within a couple of
weeks mean almost a total collapse of our economy.

It would be very serious and our chances of getting a share of other
sources would be virtually nil.
So there is no planning that could cope with it.

However, in the event of moderately fast climbing prices some planning
would be feasible, but would require some government direction of adaption.
The problem is that politicians just cannot comprehend the problem.

Bazz,

Biocapacity can be defined as “The capacity of ecosystems to produce useful biological materials and to absorb waste materials generated by humans, using current management schemes and extraction technologies.”

So in general terms, how much can be extracted from nature compared to how quickly nature can regenerate.

If you look at the trend for Australia, it is very much downhill.

http://awsassets.wwf.org.au/downloads/mc079_country_factsheet_australia_living_planet_report_2012_15may12.pdf

Australia is heading towards “overshoot”, where the ecological footprint line crosses the biocapacity line.

For example, China hit overshoot about 1968, although its biocapacity has now levelled out.

http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/trends/china/

Many countries have already hit overshoot, and what it means is that they have to beg, borrow or steal resources from another country to survive.

Oil is an example of that, but many other resources worldwide are becoming similar.

I feel very confident Tony Abbot will shortly address the nation, and tell us what we have to do to get our biocapacity increasing instead of decreasing.

Perhaps next week.

Yes, interesting, well it the same message all round.
The politicians keep saying more GDP, more growth, more people more,
more, more !
Politicians: Energy ? what about it ? Nothing for you to worry about !

The primary limiting factor is energy.
Once it limits, everything limits.

I HAVE DECIDED STIGGIE IS A RED HERRING*
its not your land
its god's
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-evIyrrjTTY&feature=em-share_video_user

war crimes/media bias/aiding and giving comfort to demons
ABC Manipulates Truth to Fit Pro-Israel Bias
morehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdKPJZKXtWQ



Abby Martin calls out the media framing of the current violence in Gaza and Israel, highlighting how ABC's Diane Sawyer misdirected viewers when reporting on the violence in Israel while showing pictures of destruction in Gaza.

LIKE Breaking the Set @ http://fb.me/JournalistAbbyMartin
FOLLOW Abby Martin @ http://twitter.com/AbbyMartin

Blackwater awarded over $1bn from State Dept.
since threat on investigator's life
T
http://whatreallyhappened.com/podcasts/hourtitle2.m3u


Argentineans hold protest at Israel embassy in Buenos Aires
http://rt.com/usa/172156-blackwater-contracts-threat-investigator/

Muslim and Arab organizations have gathered outside the Israeli embassy in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires to express outrage at Tel Aviv’s ongoing atrocities against the Palestinians, Press TV reports.

http://presstv.com/detail/2014/07/08/370432/argentine-protesters-slam-israel-cruelty/

visit ya sister/then ya dead/we will know them by their deeds
http://rt.com/news/172052-gaza-israel-fighting-victims/

I really placed oil & other energy as the primary and most critical
factor, but I overlooked water.
Water is the first, top of the list, critical supply.

However it could not become unavailable or in very short supply everywhere
at the same time. Even coal is not in that situation.
That is what worries me, not immediately for myself but for all our
younger citizens.

The first problem that I see is that some degenerate
madmen have taken over in part of the middle east.
They are the sort that could stop export of oil from that area just to
nark us and there would be nothing we could do about it.
Attacks on terminals and pipelines could reduce world supply by 25%.
Even if control could be imposed in say one month, it could then take
many months to repair.

If Australia could not get any supply from Vietnam, China would
ensure that, and we would be lost in the scramble.
Our economy would collapse and food would be short.

What chance an insurance company would accept the risk ?
Anyway it is an uninsurable risk.
That is what government should be planning for, but they are just
not able to accept the possibility.
I have a connection to the State Emergency Management committee
organisation at a lower level and I have broached this scenario with
them suggesting that a Disaster Plan should be prepared for Police,
SES and Dept Community Services for something like I suggest here,
but I cannot get it pushed up the system.
I could write it myself, but you how it is, "they" have to be able
to say they thought of it.

incomuircado

Perhaps if you were to start by taking the most obvious step - stop using depletable resources.

Don't know why you were thinking that step was political? You can do it all by yourself can't you?