The Measure of Economies
Measuring Productivity in an Age of Technological Change
Marshall B Reinsdorf editor Louise Sheiner editor
Format:Hardback
Publisher:The University of Chicago Press
Publishing:16th Dec '24
£52.00
This title is due to be published on 16th December, and will be despatched as soon as possible.
Innovative new approaches for improving GDP measurement to better gauge economic productivity.
Official measures of gross domestic product (GDP) indicate that productivity growth has declined in the United States over the last two decades. This has led to calls for policy changes from pro-business tax reform to stronger antitrust measures. But are our twentieth-century economic methods actually measuring our twenty-first-century productivity?
The Measure of Economies offers a synthesis of the state of knowledge in productivity measurement at a time when many question the accuracy and scope of GDP. With chapters authored by leading economic experts on topics such as the digital economy, health care, and the environment, it highlights the inadequacies of current practices and discusses cutting-edge alternatives.
Pragmatic and forward-facing, The Measure of Economies is an essential resource not only for social scientists, but also for policymakers and business leaders seeking to understand the complexities of economic growth in a time of rapidly evolving technology.
“Productivity growth is central to improvements in the well-being of a society. In recent years, there have been significant questions about the accuracy of our productivity measures. Sheiner, Reinsdorf, and their collaborators tackle those questions, laying out how the statistical agencies measure productivity, identifying where the problems with the measures lie and—importantly—suggesting possible steps towards improving them.” -- Katharine G. Abraham | University of Maryland
“Measuring productivity does not catch the eye of headline writers, which is lamentable since productivity is a vital issue. Reinsdorf, Sheiner, and the all-star team they’ve assembled are to be congratulated on a book that lays out not only the shortcomings in the statistical system, but also its strengths and the obstacles that make improvements so difficult to achieve. This book will, I hope, inspire actions to fix some of the potholes in our current measurement methods.” -- Martin Neil Baily | Brookings Institution
ISBN: 9780226836331
Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 28mm
Weight: 626g
368 pages