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Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

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Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#171

Post by 29083011397778 »

nullc wrote: post #142
voisin wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where are the politicians today who can quote Aeschylus at will? What happened to our national discourse that we’ve filled it with dimwits?

To be fair, that kind of speech would alienate a lot of the public. An intelligent politician wouldn't even if they could-- unless they were running a very specialized campaign. It's informative to look up some very old videos of George W speaking-- he sounds much more educated than he did when in office. Now that speaking in a highly educated manner has become a signal of elite indifference (however that came to pas…

> Since anyone who could do it could turn it off, and they should turn it off

I sincerely hope you mean they ought to turn it off for the campaign trail, and even that's a depressing recommendation for those seeking public support.

Words matter. The language we use to discuss the world around us has a distinct influence on how we see, interact with, and frame both problems and solutions. Lowering the level of discourse helps nobody. That's why it's ill-advised to speak only in babytalk to young children - we want to help improve their language skills through practice, and by leading by example.

The English language (and I'm sure others) is a sprawling mess, but different words do have different connotations and histories that can have a practical affect on those you're speaking to. For example, speaking informally about firearms has left the Conservatives under the impression that legislators are drafting laws they don't really understand - and it's hard to fault them for that.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#172

Post by kortilla »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #138
kortilla wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy absolutely does not care about you and thinking it does is damaging to democracy. Democracy is just executing the will of the majority. If your interests don’t align with thah majority, the country is not acting on your behalf. Knowing that an participating in democracy without tying up your identity in the outcomes is critical.

Well it does care about you, just that the level of care you receive is roughly what hundreds of millions of others also get. 1/250000000 is a pretty small amount in the grand scheme. We typically round down small fractions to zero so a very niche opinion with a few hundred folks is still approximately zero.

No, that math isn’t correct. If you are in the minority, there is no compromise in democracy. The level of care you receive is exactly 0 if the majority voted against you.

20 years ago you couldn’t have 40% of a gay marriage, it was just no gay marriage.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#173

Post by nicoburns »

Phiwise_ wrote: post #97
nicoburns wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue that "free market" pricing in general is. The attitude that "something is valuable if people are willing to pay for it" is being increasingly overfitted.

Overfitted to what? If the whole point of economics in a moral sense is to get people more value, than what does the question of if person A will buy item 1 at a higher price than person B for item 2 for better or worse reasons get the average person/company except for a distraction from their goal? Make item 1, sell it to person A, and go enjoy your more prosperity than you would have gotten for selling item 2 to pe…

Overfitted to the current legal context, market conditions, regulations, etc.

A classic example would be a company which outcompetes its rivals by working around regulation that companies in that sector are subject to. That enables it to gain a competitive advantage within the system it's operating in, but is pessimisation rather than an optimisation when looking at the bigger picture and longer timescales.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#174

Post by kortilla »

eyelidlessness wrote: post #161
kortilla wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy absolutely does not care about you and thinking it does is damaging to democracy. Democracy is just executing the will of the majority. If your interests don’t align with thah majority, the country is not acting on your behalf. Knowing that an participating in democracy without tying up your identity in the outcomes is critical.

> Democracy is just executing the will of the majority. Only if you’re a dictionary. Democracy as practiced routinely resists the will of the majority (eg attitudes towards climate, reproductive rights), and also routinely reinforces minoritarian protections once established (eg accessibility for people with disabilities). Democracy is ultimately the same thing as any other governing philosophy, except it’s more mall…

You’re quibbling over the layers of indirection a representative democracy adds, but it doesn’t fundamentally change. If the majority of people wanted to strips rights for those with disabilities, they would be well within the constitution to do it.

> Democracy is ultimately the same thing as any other governing philosophy, except it’s more malleable by people without concentrated power than most other systems. Certainly more than a bank or whatever.

Sure, but the point is that regardless of governing mechanism, the government is not acting in your interest (unless you’re an authoritarian dictator and even then there is internal resistance).

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#175

Post by tuatoru »

imoreno wrote: post #147

GDP, like many economic metrics, is of course not an absolute indicator of anything significant. You can set up two shell companies and have them buy and sell the same paper clip between them thousands of times a second, for a million dollars each. It will boost GDP by quite a lot. Of course historically, such deception has not always dominated, and the apparent GDP has been a good proxy for total genuine economic ac…

> You can set up two shell companies and have them buy and sell the same paper clip between them thousands of times a second, for a million dollars each.

In the case of used goods, the only effect on GDP comes from the transaction fees paid to the broker. Same with buying an already existing house: the GDP contribution is the real estate and legal fees.

And with the stock and bond markets: a trillion dollars' worth of stock changing hands only affects GDP to the extent of the brokerage fees, maybe a billion, maybe less.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#176

Post by Nullabillity »

Retric wrote: post #110
Nullabillity wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Entertainment is positive value ("I want to watch/play/whatever this because I enjoy it"), healthcare is compensation for negative value ("I got injured and want to feel a little less shit"). Nobody goes to the doctor just because they felt like doing it that day. Counting the positive contribution of healthcare without counting the negative contributions of the injuries that lead people to seek healthcare is going t…

First do you really think people will get more injured to game GDP? Anyway the metric is capacity to fulfill peoples wants. If the population has injuries then it will be less productive and therefore have a lower GDP. See the broken window fallacy.

> First do you really think people will get more injured to game GDP?

Death squads going out and punching people to get them into hospitals? Probably not.

Lowering safety/emissions/etc standards in ways that both lead to increased immediate profit and (hopefully unintentionally) causes an increase in injuries over time? Absolutely.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#177

Post by zsz »

eyelidlessness wrote: post #161
kortilla wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy absolutely does not care about you and thinking it does is damaging to democracy. Democracy is just executing the will of the majority. If your interests don’t align with thah majority, the country is not acting on your behalf. Knowing that an participating in democracy without tying up your identity in the outcomes is critical.

> Democracy is just executing the will of the majority. Only if you’re a dictionary. Democracy as practiced routinely resists the will of the majority (eg attitudes towards climate, reproductive rights), and also routinely reinforces minoritarian protections once established (eg accessibility for people with disabilities). Democracy is ultimately the same thing as any other governing philosophy, except it’s more mall…

"Democracy" is just the latest invention of the ruling class, frustrated by such events as the French revolution, or more recently, the fates of individuals such as Nicolae Ceausescu.

In practice, it causes the rabble to redirect their grievances from a formerly monolithic leadership to each other, increasingly turning a blind eye to mounting corruption and abuses of privilege within their own ranks, while blaming all the evils of the world on the other side.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#179

Post by Aunche »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #168
lkrubner wrote: post #58

Robert Kennedy, on the campaign trail in 1968: "Too much and for too long, we seemed to have surrendered personal excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our Gross National Product, now, is over $800 billion dollars a year, but that Gross National Product - if we judge the United States of America by that - that Gross National Product counts air pollution and cigarette advertising…

And shortly thereafter, he was assassinated. Another historical "fun fact", is that MLK wasn't assassinated while pushing for civil rights. He was killed once he shifted his focus to financial injustice and wealth inequality. Two might not be a pattern, but it's no accident these historical figures were both challenging the deep pockets status quo and they both died prematurely.

Robert Kennedy was the son of the equivalent of a billionaire and the brother of a President. He was the status quo.

Re: Gross domestic product is a misleading measure of national success (2014)

#180

Post by gibspaulding »

glial wrote: post #162
yucky wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Democracy is incompatible with freedom. As soon as enough people decide I should die or lose my possessions or do some other thing I don't want to do, I am forced against my will with violence. So we are stuck relying on the intelligence and wisdom and foresight of the masses. No wonder we're screwed.

Curious to know your definition of freedom, and what system of government it is compatible with.

I was expecting some sort of pivot to "but of course all government is incompatible with freedom, and democracy is better than most, and anarchy doesn't scale well, so democracy it is!"
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