Measuring What Counts

Author: Joseph E. Stiglitz
Publisher: The New Press
ISBN: 162097570X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 257

Book Description
A bold agenda for a better way to assess societal well-being, by three of the world's leading economists and statisticians "If we want to put people first, we have to know what matters to them, what improves their well-being, and how we can supply more of whatever that is." —Joseph E. Stiglitz In 2009, a group of economists led by Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz, French economist Jean-Paul Fitoussi, and Nobel laureate Amartya Sen issued a report challenging gross domestic product (GDP) as a measure of progress and well-being. Published as Mismeasuring Our Lives by The New Press, the book sparked a global conversation about GDP and a major movement among scholars, policy makers, and activists to change the way we measure our economies. Now, in Measuring What Counts, Stiglitz, Fitoussi, and Martine Durand—summarizing the deliberations of a panel of experts on the measurement of economic performance and social progress hosted at the OECD, the international organization incorporating the most economically advanced countries—propose a new, "beyond GDP" agenda. This book provides an accessible overview of the last decade's global movement, sparked by the original critique of GDP, and proposes a new "dashboard" of metrics to assess a society's health, including measures of inequality and economic vulnerability, whether growth is environmentally sustainable, and how people feel about their lives. Essential reading for our time, it also serves as a guide for policy makers and others on how to use these new tools to fundamentally change the way we measure our lives—and to plot a radically new path forward.

Measuring What Counts

Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309049865
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 32

Book Description
Measuring What Counts: A Policy Brief provides highlights of the main volume in the context of implications for educational policy.

What Really Counts

Author: Ronald Colman
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231549180
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 516

Book Description
Politicians and economists fixate on “growing the economy”—measured by a country’s gross domestic product. But this yardstick counts harmful activities such as greenhouse gas emissions, plastic waste, and cigarette sales as gains, and it ignores environmental protection, voluntary community work, and other benefits. What we measure is a choice, and what is and isn’t counted determines what sorts of policies are enacted. How can we shift the focus to well-being and quality of life? What Really Counts is an essential, firsthand story of the promise and challenges of accounting for social, economic, and environmental benefits and costs. Ronald Colman recounts two decades of working with three governments to adopt measures that more accurately and comprehensively assess true progress. Chronicling his path from Nova Scotia to New Zealand to Bhutan, Colman details the challenge of devising meaningful metrics, the effort to lay the foundations of a new economic system, and the obstacles that stand in the way. Reflecting on successes and failures, he considers how to shift policy priorities from a narrow economic-growth agenda toward a future built on sustainability and equity. Colman has taken the critique of GDP outside the academy and attempted to realize an alternative. The lessons he offers in What Really Counts are vital for anyone interested in how we can measure what matters—and how better measures can help build a better world.

Mismeasuring Our Lives

Author: Jean-Paul Fitouss
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 1459617797
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 230

Book Description
In February of 2008, amid the looming global financial crisis, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France asked Nobel Prize-winning economists Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen, along with the distinguished French economist Jean Paul Fitoussi, to establish a commission of leading economists to study whether Gross Domestic Product (GDP) - the most widely used measure of economic activity - is a reliable indicator of economic and social progress. The Commission was given the further task of laying out an agenda for developing better measures. Mismeasuring Our Lives is the result of this major intellectual effort, one with pressing relevance for anyone engaged in assessing how and whether our economy is serving the needs of our society. The authors offer a sweeping assessment of the limits of GDP as a measurement of the well-being of societies - considering, for example, how GDP overlooks economic inequality (with the result that most people can be worse off even though average income is increasing); and does not factor environmental impacts into economic decisions.In place of GDP, Mismeasuring Our Lives introduces a bold new array of concepts, from sustainable measures of economic welfare, to measures of savings and wealth, to a ''green GDP.'' At a time when policymakers worldwide are grappling with unprecedented global financial and environmental issues, here is an essential guide to measuring the things that matter.

For Good Measure

Author: Joseph E. Stiglitz
Publisher: The New Press
ISBN: 1620975726
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 450

Book Description
Today's leading economists weigh in with a new "dashboard" of metrics for measuring our economic and social health "What we measure affects what we do. If we focus only on material well-being—on, say, the production of goods, rather than on health, education, and the environment—we become distorted in the same way that these measures are distorted." —Joseph E. Stiglitz A consensus has emerged among key experts that our conventional economic measures are out of sync with how most people live their lives. GDP, they argue, is a poor and outmoded measure of our well-being. The global movement to move beyond GDP has attracted some of the world's leading economists, statisticians, and social thinkers who have worked collectively to articulate new approaches to measuring economic well-being and social progress. In the decade since the 2008 economic crisis, these experts have come together to determine what indicators can actually tell us about people's lives. In the first book of its kind, leading economists from around the world, including Thomas Piketty, Emmanuel Saez, Elizabeth Beasely, Jacob Hacker, François Bourguignon, Nora Lustig, Alan B. Krueger, and Joseph E. Stiglitz, describe a range of fascinating metrics—from economic insecurity and environmental sustainability to inequality of opportunity and levels of trust and resilience—that can be used to supplement the simplistic measure of gross domestic product, providing a far more nuanced and accurate account of societal health and well-being. This groundbreaking volume is sure to provide a major source of ideas and inspiration for one of the most important intellectual movements of our time.

Measuring What Counts

Author: National Research Council
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309049814
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 240

Book Description
To achieve national goals for education, we must measure the things that really count. Measuring What Counts establishes crucial research- based connections between standards and assessment. Arguing for a better balance between educational and measurement concerns in the development and use of mathematics assessment, this book sets forth three principlesâ€"related to content, learning, and equityâ€"that can form the basis for new assessments that support emerging national standards in mathematics education.

Counting for Nothing

Author: Marilyn Waring
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 144265614X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Book Description
Safe drinking water counts for nothing. A pollution-free environment counts for nothing. Even some people - namely women - count for nothing. This is the case, at least, according to the United Nations System of National Accounts. Author Marilyn Waring, former New Zealand M.P., now professor, development consultant, writer, and goat farmer, isolates the gender bias that exists in the current system of calculating national wealth. As Waring observes, in this accounting system women are considered 'non-producers' and as such they cannot expect to gain from the distribution of benefits that flow from production. Issues like nuclear warfare, environmental conservation, and poverty are likewise excluded from the calculation of value in traditional economic theory. As a result, public policy, determined by these same accounting processes, inevitably overlooks the importance of the environment and half the world's population. Counting for Nothing, originally published in 1988, is a classic feminist analysis of women's place in the world economy brought up to date in this reprinted edition, including a sizeable new introduction by the author. In her new introduction, the author updates information and examples and revisits the original chapters with appropriate commentary. In an accessible and often humorous manner, Waring offers an explanation of the current economic systems of accounting and thoroughly outlines ways to ensure that the significance of the environment and the labour contributions of women receive the recognition they deserve.

Measuring Culture

Author: John W. Mohr
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231542585
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 290

Book Description
Social scientists seek to develop systematic ways to understand how people make meaning and how the meanings they make shape them and the world in which they live. But how do we measure such processes? Measuring Culture is an essential point of entry for both those new to the field and those who are deeply immersed in the measurement of meaning. Written collectively by a team of leading qualitative and quantitative sociologists of culture, the book considers three common subjects of measurement—people, objects, and relationships—and then discusses how to pivot effectively between subjects and methods. Measuring Culture takes the reader on a tour of the state of the art in measuring meaning, from discussions of neuroscience to computational social science. It provides both the definitive introduction to the sociological literature on culture as well as a critical set of case studies for methods courses across the social sciences.

Beyond GDP

Author: Marc Fleurbaey
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199346917
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 395

Book Description
In spite of recurrent criticism and an impressive production of alternative indicators by scholars and NGOs, GDP remains the central indicator of countries' success. This book revisits the foundations of indicators of social welfare, and critically examines the four main alternatives to GDP that have been proposed: composite indicators, subjective well-being indexes, capabilities (the underlying philosophy of the Human Development Index), and equivalent incomes. Its provocative thesis is that the problem with GDP is not that it uses a monetary metric but that it focuses on a narrow set of aspects of individual lives. It is actually possible to build an alternative, more comprehensive, monetary indicator that takes income as its first benchmark and adds or subtracts corrections that represent the benefit or cost of non-market aspects of individual lives. Such a measure can respect the values and preferences of the people and give as much weight as they do to the non-market dimensions. A further provocative idea is that, in contrast, most of the currently available alternative indicators, including subjective well-being indexes, are not as respectful of people's values because, like GDP, they are too narrow and give specific weights to the various dimensions of life in a more uniform way, without taking account of the diversity of views on life in the population. The popular attraction that such alternative indicators derive from being non-monetary is therefore based on equivocation. Moreover, it is argued in this book that "greening" GDP and relative indicators is not the proper way to incorporate sustainability concerns. Sustainability involves predicting possible future paths, therefore different indicators than those assessing the current situation. While various indicators have been popular (adjusted net savings, ecological footprint), none of them involves the necessary forecasting effort that a proper evaluation of possible futures requires.

Measures of Health Literacy

Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309139805
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 142

Book Description
Health literacy-the ability for individuals to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services to facilitate appropriate health decisions-is increasingly recognized as an important facet of health care and health outcomes. Although research on health literacy has grown tremendously in the past decade, there is no widely agreed-upon framework for health literacy as a determinant of health outcomes. Most instruments focus on assessing an individual's health literacy, yet the scope of health literacy reaches far beyond an individual's skills and abilities. Health literacy occurs in the context of the health care system, and therefore measures of health literacy must also assess the demands and complexities of the health care systems with which patients interact. For example, measures are needed to determine how well the system has been organized so that it can be navigated by individuals with different levels of health literacy and how well health organizations are doing at making health information understandable and actionable. To examine what is known about measures of health literacy, the Institute of Medicine convened a workshop. The workshop, summarized in this volume, reviews the current status of measures of health literacy, including those used in the health care setting; discusses possible surrogate measures that might be used to assess health literacy; and explores ways in which health literacy measures can be used to assess patient-centered approaches to care.