Economics
About GDP

QUORA question ... Is GDP a good measure of economic growth? Why or why not?

Burgess COMMENTARY

Peter Burgess

Is GDP a good measure of economic growth? Why or why not? This question previously had details. They are now in a comment. Erik Hille, M.S. Economics, Southern Methodist University (2014) Answered Aug 16 GDP per capita in PPP or other constant dollar benchmark is the standard. World bank data is probably the most used source but the CIA and IMF are the other often used sources. See Don Sillers' answer to What data should I look at when comparing the growth of countries? for the simple answer. Gross Domestic Product per capita is a good measure of economic output, wealth and well being of a country, and this should be compared across countries adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP) (adjusting for both inflation and difference in prices). The value and growth rate are both important. Belize You could run lots of other macro controls if you are actually trying to run regressions: education, government to private sector ratios, government spending, corruption index, democracy index, institutions index, rule of law index, enforceability of contracts index, security of private property index, inflation, at least one local interest rate benchmark, urbanization, import and export normalized to for economies size (GDP), wars, military spending, FDI, growth sectors measurement such as textiles and electronics or other sectors of interest, economic sectors such as oil diamonds and other resource sectors subject to Dutch oil disease, and any other hypothesis or idea you might want to be testing. Lots of sources. World Bank Data. Lots of years. Lots of Countries Countries | Data. Lots of of data variables (Topics | Data - Indicators | Data - Catalog), years and Countries. Education Index multiple sheets of excel data is available at Human Development Reports or you can use their tool to explore the data Human Development Reports also google has access to explore the data Google Public Data Explorer additional indexes in this HD report that you might be interest in are: Human Development Index and Adult Literacy Index and Gross enrollment ratio Consumer Price Index International Trade Our government also likes to stay globally informed and is willing to share some of that data: CIA -The World Factbook Political liberties and freedoms: there are a whole host of organization that track similar ideas in each of their various freedom indices: CIRI Human Rights Data Project by University of Connecticut. Democracy Index by U.K. Economist Intelligence Unit. Economic Freedom of the World Index by Canadian Fraser Institute. Freedom in the World and Freedom of the Press by Freedom House. Index of Economic Freedom by The Wall Street Journal and Heritage Foundation. Index of Freedom in the World by Fraser Institute Liberales Institute, and Cato Institute, they are also now publishing Human Freedom Index. MaxRange, by Max Rånge maintained in conjunction with Mikael Sandberg both from Halmstad University, Sweden. The U.S.-based Polity data series sponsored by Political Instability Task Force(PITF) and Central Intelligence Agency funding. Worldwide Press Freedom Index by French Reporters Without Borders. World Index of Moral Freedom by Spanish Foundation for the Advancement of Liberty. World Audit - Democracy Press Freedom and Corruption Rankings. Corruption Perceptions Index: Transparency International (TI) has published the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI - Research - Overview, and Corruption Perceptions Index 2015 Report). Other similar measure are provided by Corruption Watch, World Bank - CPIA transparency, accountability, and corruption, and Government Defence Anti-Corruption Index. Pollution, environment and degradation of non renewable natural resources: Air quality index, Air Pollution Index, Pollution Index by City 2016 Mid Year, Real-time World Air Quality Index and Air Pollution in World: Real-time Air Quality Index Visual Map world wide map of current conditions, Air Quality Index (AQI) Basics, 2016 Social Progress Index Methodological Report, Yale’s and NASA’s Environmental Performance Index (Environmental Performance Index - EPI, Environmental Performance Index (EPI)) Misery index (economics) dreamed up by Arthur Okun it presumes that there is social cost to inflation and unemployment, and thus the index is calculated by adding the two. If there is not already an index that covers your perception of what should be measured in the consumption, production, health and well being of the citizenry of a country, please go get a PhD in economics and start developing and publishing your results and Index. The point is to show that your Index though economically based has higher correlation with future growth or measures of happiness or some other independent measure of the successful result of the economy. Is GDP a good measure of a nation's wealth/stability/etc? Where can I find data on education quality in developing countries? Erik Hille's answer to What are some publicly available big data sets (free) in the areas of finance and economics? Erik Hille's answer to Where can I find large datasets open to the public? How can an economist assess an economy's economic performance? What is the best economic model a developing country should engage? Is the average GDP growth higher in countries with less government intervention? What data should I look at when comparing the growth of countries? Thank you for the A2A Kris Haamer. 10.4k Views · 11 Upvotes · Answer requested by Samuel Liu