Date: Tuesday, August 31, 1999 7:35 PM Tom Lehman wrote:
>Chang, I don't think that anyone thinks that GDP is a perfect measure of
economic
>performance. GDP is only a tool for making gross calculations about accepted
>measurable quantities and their increase or decrease in relation to each other.
>Even among professionals there are differences of opinion on how some of these
>quantities should be calculated in relation to each other--note the thread on
>software as capital on this list.
>
>Tom Lehman
>
>
>chang wrote:
>
>> Date: Monday, August 30, 1999 9:20 PM Doug Henwood wrote:
>> >chang wrote:
>> >
>> >>Why economists all over the world still use Gross Domestic Product
>> >>to judge the
>> >>economic growth of a certain country and, according to this GDP,
>> >>calculate this
>> >>country's economic growth rate?
>> >
>> >GDP measures the production of goods for market and their sale. It's
>> >not meant to say anything about the distribution of income or the
>> >level of human happiness, though sometimes people take it to be so.
>> >What's your point?
>> >
>> >Doug
>> >
>> >
>>
>> Why economists measure only the production of goods for market and their sale?
>> Why they don't say anything about the distribution of income or the level of
>> human happiness? Should they say anything about the living standards of poor
>> people?
>>
>> Sincerely,
>> Ju-chang He
>>
>> SHENZHEN, P.R. CHINA
>> Welcome to My Homepage
>> <http://sites.netscape.net/juchang/>
>
>