Gross Domestic Problem
* Book: Gross Domestic Problem: The Politics Behind the World's Most Powerful Number. By Lorenzo Fioramonti.
URL = http://zedbooks.co.uk/paperback/gross-domestic-problem
Michel Bauwens recommends: a very readable overview of the political history of GDP.
Description
From the author page:
"Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is arguably the most well-known statistic in the contemporary world, and certainly amongst the most powerful. It drives government policy and sets priorities in a variety of vital social fields – from schooling to healthcare. Yet for perhaps the first time since it was invented in the 1930s, this popular icon of economic growth has come to be regarded by many as a ‘problem’. After all, does our quality of life really improve when our economy grows 2 or 3%? Can we continue to sacrifice the environment to safeguard a vision of the world based on the illusion of infinite economic growth?
In Gross Domestic Problem, Lorenzo Fioramonti takes apart the ‘content’ of GDP – what it measures, what it doesn’t and why – and reveals the powerful political interests that have allowed it to dominate today’s economies. In doing so, he demonstrates just how little relevance GDP has to moral principles such as equity, social justice and redistribution, and shows that an alternative is possible, as evinced by the ‘de-growth’ movement and initiatives such as transition towns.
A startling insight into the politics of a number that has come to dominate our everyday lives."
(https://lorenzofioramonti.org/books/)
More Information
- More books on the same topic by the same author: https://lorenzofioramonti.org/books/
- HOW NUMBERS RULE THE WORLD: The Use and Abuse of Statistics in Global Politics (Zed Books, 2014) [1]
- NEW RULES FOR GLOBAL JUSTICE: Structural Redistribution in the Global Economy (Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), edited with Jan Aart Scholte and Alfred G. Nhema
- THE WORLD AFTER GDP: Economics, Politics and International Relations in the Post-Growth Era (Polity Books, 2017) [2]
- WELLBEING ECONOMY: Success in a World Without Growth (Macmillan, 2017) [3]