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Beyond the GDP – five governments are pushing to relaunch economic well-being

Beyond GDP: measuring what counts for economic and social performance, reads the title of the book wrote in 2021 by Joseph Stiglitz (winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics), Jean-Paul Fitoussi (who’d been expecting the Nobel Prize for some time but unfortunately passed away in April 2022) and Martine Durand. And it’s just about time we went beyond the Gross Domestic Product, a tool that measures the amount of wealth produced rather than the quality of economic decisions’ outcomes, when “what really matters is well-being”.

The book, published in Italy by Einaudi, explored the topics discussed in a famous report from 2009, commissioned by then-President of France Nicolas Sarkozy, on measuring the outcomes of economic performance and social processes – a report that had actually been written by Stiglitz, Fitoussi and Amartya Sen (also a Nobel Prize winner) and was then further analysed by a committee of OECD experts. The underlying aim was to propose a new economic agenda accompanied by a new set of metrics that would ascertain a society’s state of health and adequacy, with a focus on inequality, economic vulnerability, environmental sustainability, people’s perception of their life conditions and ways to improve them.

Outside economic debate, this theme has been relaunched at the end of 2022 through a prominent political initiative launched by five heads of state – Jacinta Arden (New Zealand), Sanna Marin (Finland), Katrin Jacobsdóttir (Iceland), Nicola Sturgeon (Scotland) and Mark Drakeford (Wales) – who have chosen to collaborate together in a “Well-being Economy Governments Partnership”, which might also include Canada and Australia soon. Well-being, indeed – a political choice with great strategic value.

The basic concept is to steer political decisions towards matters such as quality of life, environmental and social sustainability, and economic development, going beyond the purely quantitative dimension of growth as measured by GDP. Hence, choosing the appropriate measurement units is extraordinarily important in terms of politics and ethics, to ensure that wealth distribution, the opportunities arising for the new generations, health, education, and the challenging eradication of inequalities are taken into consideration, rather than just wealth production.

These times of crisis, which we’ve been experiencing since the beginning of the new millennium (starting with climate and environmental disasters, pandemics, financial crashes, geopolitical tensions and up to war, social rifts and wider geographical, generational and gender gaps) have re-established the need for a radical review of traditional economic parameters, a shift towards a “just economy” (Pope Francis’s beloved expression) and the adoption of new development paths.

This has certainly nothing to do with the “happy degrowth” theorised by quirky economists inspired by Serge Latouche (rather, a situation with no growth, and therefore no redistribution of resources, available investments for innovation or new employment opportunities, would be an unhappy one). On the contrary, there’s a lot to discuss right at this moment: the environment, social justice, finding a way to bridge the severe ruptures caused by the traditional – and warped – balance between manufacturing and trade, all of which demands a reassessment of current relationships, powers and values, as well as a revision of the new economic maps rather than merely – and scantily – readjusting the distribution of wealth (profits, stock market prices) generated by the current economic system, as new maps are key to rebalancing the global economy.

Civic economy, circular economy, generative economy – all terms that are progressively enriching cultural and social debate, and that have an impact on the search for new and better assets, for life, and for the future.

Essentially, we need a shift from the supremacy of shareholder values (profits) to stakeholder values (the values and interests concerning all those involved in a company, such as employees, suppliers, customers and consumers, members of the community and the territories affected by a company’s activities). Indeed, such shift is becoming increasingly relevant even in the political sphere. Echoes of it are increasingly resounding in “social and sustainability reports” and, above all, in the choices made by several industrial and financial groups that are endeavouring to include those voices in their financial report: a manifest move towards good corporate ethics and true corporate integrity. Well-being, then, and sustainability.

A thorough analysis of the EU’s recent economic decisions, such as the implementation of the Recovery Fund to counteract the post-pandemic crisis, also shows clear evidence of these new concerns, such as a focus on the next generation, education, health, economic research, and a sustainable environmental and digital twin transition. This implies a better future, a future in which Europe, by rediscovering, relaunching and reforming its deep past and current concern for welfare, could play a key role as its aims are clearly in line with those of Arden and Marin’s Well-being Economy concept.

Italy, too, has a prominent role in this reforming process, as demonstrated by its BES (Benessere equo e sostenibile -Equitable and sustainable well-being), an index devised by ISTAT and CNEL that, since 2017, has been part of the Italian government’s Economic and Financial Document, measuring the performance of Italy’s social condition through 12 parameters – an indicator to which we must increasingly pay attention.

As this reform of the economy, its values and indexes continues, it’s worth remembering the great political lecture delivered by Robert Kennedy as part of a speech to students of the University of Kansas in March 1968, three months before he was assassinated, which indeed described the GDP as something that measures everything “except that which makes life worthwhile” and “can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”

Here it is, than, Kennedy’s warning: “We will find neither national purpose nor personal satisfaction in a mere continuation of economic progress, in an endless amassing of worldly goods. We cannot measure national spirit by the Dow Jones Average, nor national achievement by the Gross National Product.” The GDP, in fact, “counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.”

Basically, the GDP “does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country.” And more than half a century later, the message remains as relevant as ever.

(Photo Getty Images)

Beyond GDP: measuring what counts for economic and social performance, reads the title of the book wrote in 2021 by Joseph Stiglitz (winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics), Jean-Paul Fitoussi (who’d been expecting the Nobel Prize for some time but unfortunately passed away in April 2022) and Martine Durand. And it’s just about time we went beyond the Gross Domestic Product, a tool that measures the amount of wealth produced rather than the quality of economic decisions’ outcomes, when “what really matters is well-being”.

The book, published in Italy by Einaudi, explored the topics discussed in a famous report from 2009, commissioned by then-President of France Nicolas Sarkozy, on measuring the outcomes of economic performance and social processes – a report that had actually been written by Stiglitz, Fitoussi and Amartya Sen (also a Nobel Prize winner) and was then further analysed by a committee of OECD experts. The underlying aim was to propose a new economic agenda accompanied by a new set of metrics that would ascertain a society’s state of health and adequacy, with a focus on inequality, economic vulnerability, environmental sustainability, people’s perception of their life conditions and ways to improve them.

Outside economic debate, this theme has been relaunched at the end of 2022 through a prominent political initiative launched by five heads of state – Jacinta Arden (New Zealand), Sanna Marin (Finland), Katrin Jacobsdóttir (Iceland), Nicola Sturgeon (Scotland) and Mark Drakeford (Wales) – who have chosen to collaborate together in a “Well-being Economy Governments Partnership”, which might also include Canada and Australia soon. Well-being, indeed – a political choice with great strategic value.

The basic concept is to steer political decisions towards matters such as quality of life, environmental and social sustainability, and economic development, going beyond the purely quantitative dimension of growth as measured by GDP. Hence, choosing the appropriate measurement units is extraordinarily important in terms of politics and ethics, to ensure that wealth distribution, the opportunities arising for the new generations, health, education, and the challenging eradication of inequalities are taken into consideration, rather than just wealth production.

These times of crisis, which we’ve been experiencing since the beginning of the new millennium (starting with climate and environmental disasters, pandemics, financial crashes, geopolitical tensions and up to war, social rifts and wider geographical, generational and gender gaps) have re-established the need for a radical review of traditional economic parameters, a shift towards a “just economy” (Pope Francis’s beloved expression) and the adoption of new development paths.

This has certainly nothing to do with the “happy degrowth” theorised by quirky economists inspired by Serge Latouche (rather, a situation with no growth, and therefore no redistribution of resources, available investments for innovation or new employment opportunities, would be an unhappy one). On the contrary, there’s a lot to discuss right at this moment: the environment, social justice, finding a way to bridge the severe ruptures caused by the traditional – and warped – balance between manufacturing and trade, all of which demands a reassessment of current relationships, powers and values, as well as a revision of the new economic maps rather than merely – and scantily – readjusting the distribution of wealth (profits, stock market prices) generated by the current economic system, as new maps are key to rebalancing the global economy.

Civic economy, circular economy, generative economy – all terms that are progressively enriching cultural and social debate, and that have an impact on the search for new and better assets, for life, and for the future.

Essentially, we need a shift from the supremacy of shareholder values (profits) to stakeholder values (the values and interests concerning all those involved in a company, such as employees, suppliers, customers and consumers, members of the community and the territories affected by a company’s activities). Indeed, such shift is becoming increasingly relevant even in the political sphere. Echoes of it are increasingly resounding in “social and sustainability reports” and, above all, in the choices made by several industrial and financial groups that are endeavouring to include those voices in their financial report: a manifest move towards good corporate ethics and true corporate integrity. Well-being, then, and sustainability.

A thorough analysis of the EU’s recent economic decisions, such as the implementation of the Recovery Fund to counteract the post-pandemic crisis, also shows clear evidence of these new concerns, such as a focus on the next generation, education, health, economic research, and a sustainable environmental and digital twin transition. This implies a better future, a future in which Europe, by rediscovering, relaunching and reforming its deep past and current concern for welfare, could play a key role as its aims are clearly in line with those of Arden and Marin’s Well-being Economy concept.

Italy, too, has a prominent role in this reforming process, as demonstrated by its BES (Benessere equo e sostenibile -Equitable and sustainable well-being), an index devised by ISTAT and CNEL that, since 2017, has been part of the Italian government’s Economic and Financial Document, measuring the performance of Italy’s social condition through 12 parameters – an indicator to which we must increasingly pay attention.

As this reform of the economy, its values and indexes continues, it’s worth remembering the great political lecture delivered by Robert Kennedy as part of a speech to students of the University of Kansas in March 1968, three months before he was assassinated, which indeed described the GDP as something that measures everything “except that which makes life worthwhile” and “can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”

Here it is, than, Kennedy’s warning: “We will find neither national purpose nor personal satisfaction in a mere continuation of economic progress, in an endless amassing of worldly goods. We cannot measure national spirit by the Dow Jones Average, nor national achievement by the Gross National Product.” The GDP, in fact, “counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for the people who break them. It counts napalm and counts nuclear warheads and armored cars for the police to fight the riots in our cities. It counts Whitman’s rifle and Speck’s knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.”

Basically, the GDP “does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country.” And more than half a century later, the message remains as relevant as ever.

(Photo Getty Images)