Gross domestic product

In economics, gross domestic product (GDP) is a measure of the value of economic production of a particular territory in financial capital terms during a specified period. It is one of the measures of national income and output. It is often seen as an indicator of the standard of living in a country, but there are some problems with this view.

GDP and standard of living

GDP per capita is often used as an indicator of standard of living in an economy. While this approach has advantages, many criticisms of GDP focus on its use as an indicator of standard of living.

Related Topics:
Standard of living - Economy

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The major advantages to using GDP per capita as an indicator of standard of living are that it is measured frequently, widely and consistently. Frequently in that most countries provide information on GDP on a quarterly basis, which allows a user to spot trends more quickly. Widely in that some measure of GDP is available for practically every country in the world, which allow crude comparisons between the standard of living in different countries to be compared. And consistently in that the technical definitions used within GDP are relatively consistent between countries, and so there can be confidence that the same thing is being measured in each country.

Related Topics:
Country - World

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The major disadvantage of using GDP as an indicator of standard of living is that it is not, strictly speaking, a measure of standard of living. GDP is intended to be a measure of particular types of economic activity within a country. Nothing about the definition of GDP suggests that it is necessarily a measure of standard of living. For instance, in an extreme example, a country which exported 100 per cent of its production would still have a high GDP, but a very poor standard of living.

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The argument in favour of using GDP is not that it is a good indicator of standard of living, but rather that (all other things being equal) standard of living tends to increase when GDP per capita increases. This makes GDP a proxy for standard of living, rather than a direct measure of it.

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There are a number of controversies about this use of GDP.

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