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  1. SiriuslyLong is offline
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    08-23-2011, 08:56 AM #1

    GDP Is a Lie – It’s Time for a New Measure of Economic Growth

    AUGUST 23, 2011
    BY MARTIN HUTCHINSON, Global Investing Strategist, Money Morning
    Gross domestic product (GDP) is the most commonly used measure of economic growth. But GDP isn't just inaccurate and misleading - it's the contrivance of Keynesian economists seeking to push their own, big-government agenda.

    That's right. GDP is a financial ruse - the biggest of the past half-century. And it's time to move past it to another, more accurate measure of economic growth.

    Keynesian economist Simon Kuznets designed GDP at the height of the New Deal era. Kuznets first revealed the measure in a report to Congress in 1934. GDP takes into account consumption, investment and government expenditure to create a measure of economic growth.

    But the Keynesians employed some chicanery, or sleight-of-hand, to generate this statistic. A close look reveals the dirty little secret about GDP: It intentionally overplays the importance of government spending - and in doing so inflates the role that Washington plays in each of our lives.

    And it's been doing this for 67 years ...

    The Biggest Lie of the 20th Century

    Gross domestic product is supposed to be a measure of all the goods and services produced here at home.

    But there's a discrepancy.

    You see, private-sector output is measured by the price people are prepared to pay for it. But government output is fudged: It's measured by its cost.

    That means GDP increases any time the government spends money. It doesn't matter if that money is actually put to productive use or not - GDP rises nonetheless.

    The bureaucrat devising regulations that damage business? His salary increases GDP. The $300 million Alaskan "bridge to nowhere" of a few years back? That was $300 million added to GDP. The jet-fighter project that costs billions, and is plagued by huge overruns that lead to its cancellation? Those billions add to GDP.

    Even public-spending "stimulus" programs, however foolish, are always effective according to the GDP definition, because their cost is simply added to output.

    It's obvious why big-government Keynesians would like this calculation: It substantiates their claim that government spending stimulates economic growth.

    In the real world, however, this makes no sense. Indeed, none of the examples above actually add to economic welfare.

    Don't misunderstand - some government output is very valuable. We could not exist in a free society without a court system that protects our property rights and a national defense that protects our borders. In most other cases, however, if government output were truly cost effective, the private sector would've already taken the initiative (and probably done so at lower cost and greater impact).

    So how can you get an accurate measure of economic growth?

    Arithmetically, there's a simple solution: You take Line 1, "Gross Domestic Product," in the Bureau of Economic Analysis' GDP Table and subtract from it Line 21, "Government Consumption Expenditures andGrossInvestment. "

    That gives you a net number, which we can call "gross private product," or GPP. It's a measure of all the output produced by the private sector. In general, it will underestimate national "welfare" unless government is really bad. But it will give you a much better idea of the output the market economy is producing.

    Indeed, looking at GPP's past performance helps to explain some things that GDP doesn't.

    Keynesians like to proclaim that World War II got America out of the Great Depression: Thus, if you make stimulus big enough, it will solve economic problems.

    This is the biggest lie of the 20th century.

    Finish this interesting article here: http://moneymorning.com/2011/08/23/g...onomic-growth/

    Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

  2. SiriuslyLong is offline
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    08-23-2011, 08:59 AM #2
    The ultimate fallacy of Keynesian analysis was demonstrated last weekend, when Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman claimed that an excellent solution to our economic problems would be to stage an imaginary invasion by space aliens.

    Under Keynesian analysis, all the money spent making weapons and munitions to fend off aliens would boost the economy, as it allegedly did during World War II.

    But by using GPP analysis, we can be smarter than that. We know a major anti-alien war effort would damage private output, and potentially push the U.S. Treasury into bankruptcy.

    That's Havakasha's guy! Paul Krugman. Statist brothers.