4 ms·

A key consideration should be how easy it is to 'game' well-being measurements. It's pretty hard to game economic measurements as a whole. Metrics with smalle

A key consideration should be how easy it is to 'game' well-being measurements. It's pretty hard to game economic measurements as a whole. Metrics with smaller scope are generally much easier to game so while they may be a slightly more accurate measurement initially, they may be more vulnerable to corruption.

com2kid 4y ago
> It's pretty hard to game economic measurements as a whole. Two immediate examples: Healthcare and GDP. Military Spending and GDP. If a genie wish made everyone healthy and brought about world peace, The US's GDP would drop, quite dramatically!
- aeternum 4y ago
  >If a genie wish made everyone healthy and brought about world peace, The US's GDP would drop, quite dramatically! Would it? 'We must invest in a strong military to keep the peace!' and 'Everyone is healthy, lets invest in preventative care and longevity to keep it that way!'
  - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
    The US could easily take much of that military funding and put it into infrastructure, job programs and healthcare spending and allow European countries to increase their military spending. This would keep our GDP and reduce our deficit with tax collection. Every time I suggest this, however, I seem to be downvoted into oblivion and poopooed by the Europeans on the forum. I guess a more isolationist policy isn't that great of an idea after all.
    - kranke155 4y ago
      I’m European and I fully understand that our free health care and giant social programs (on many countries) are paid for by our minuscule military spending - which turned out to be a terrible idea considering actually we live next to a revisionist and expansionist power. But Europeans liked to believe that WW2 had somehow “shown the world” that wars were unwinnable bla bla bla while really the US just installed a giant protectorate system on Europe and kept it under their nuclear umbrella (one which the continent largely decided to maintain after 1991). So yes, there are Europeans who understand (and should) that European prosperity was bought with an American military umbrella, one which we don’t pay for. But - the Trumpian argument that this architecture is “useless” is also wrong in my view. The system was constructed to benefit the US, and so it did. The problem is that after 1991 everyone got sloppy, and capital took enormous control over politics of the US and the West in general (since there were no enemies but only “opportunities for investment”) and this led to a series of poorly thought out disasters - including China in GATT/WTO hoping it would democratize, etc.
      - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
        Don't get me wrong, I'm no Trumper, and don't think we should leave NATO. But the US military expansionist policy is tiresome for the US as well as for the European population who complain about it. There are a vocal minority (maybe not even a minority) who want our young men and women to come home and have our spending aimed towards education, our crumbling infrastructure, clean energy, climate cleanup, paying down our national debt, health care and fixing social security. Those are just the top things, there are other items to do that don't involve violent expansion or nation building. We don't mind working with NATO for peace keeping missions, though. Those seem to have broad support, but the media's spell seems to have been broken for a while on this rah rah, invade every country for any manufactured reason so the few can make billions =[
        kranke155 4y ago
        I agree in a sense. As far as US military expansionism - I think the overall security architecture is sound (NATO, AUSUKNZ, Four Eyes and Japan/South Korea means that the US effectively surrounds all of its major challengers on all sides). It’s kept US dominance in place for almost a century now. And I believe that’s a good thing. But it’s on the implementation that things went haywire. Because pre-fracking the US was so dependent on foreign energy, adventurism was encouraged in Iraq which led to a major geopolitical disaster (and a huge sink for the country’s resources). In that respect, yes the expansionist policy went totally overboard, due to poor leadership and planning and unrealistic political objectives. Overall I think: - the overall architecture is sound. The US dominates and reaps benefits for it, while in my opinion maintaining peace through strength - but Europe should be spending enormous amounts more in military power - something like 5% of GDP at least - so it has a realistic chance to defeat Russia on the battlefield on its own - if that happened then the US could probably reduce its military spending (im not even sure they would because of the issues you listed though).
- nradov 4y ago
  It's easy to game military spending metrics depending on what you choose to include. For example, some countries include pension payments for retired veterans and others do not.
- Consultant32452 4y ago
  The US spends more than anyone on healthcare as a percentage of GDP and gets mediocre results at best. The most frequently proposed solution to this is to turn over more of the control of our healthcare to the people who created the current system and also lied us into the Iraq war where we killed millions of people for corporate profits.
pydry 4y ago
I remember about a decade ago I was living in Singapore and there was a minor controversy coz the country appeared near the bottom of some "happiness" country ranking. A lot of people felt vindicated by this. The government got really mad and decided, in true Singaporean fashion that the only logical solution was to create their own metric and ranking. One where, coincidentally they were #1/#2 happiest instead of #1/2 unhappiest. A completely different set of people felt equally vindicated by this.
rrrrrrrrrrrryan 4y ago
I'd argue that politicians have completely gamed the U-3 unemployment rate based on their positions toward gig work, part time work, minimum wage, etc. The various unemployment metrics used to be highly correlated, but they've diverged in recent decades. And you can absolutely dial up GDP without dialing up median income per capita as well.

com2kid 4y ago

> It's pretty hard to game economic measurements as a whole. Two immediate examples: Healthcare and GDP. Military Spending and GDP. If a genie wish made everyone healthy and brought about world peace, The US's GDP would drop, quite dramatically!

aeternum 4y ago
>If a genie wish made everyone healthy and brought about world peace, The US's GDP would drop, quite dramatically! Would it? 'We must invest in a strong military to keep the peace!' and 'Everyone is healthy, lets invest in preventative care and longevity to keep it that way!'
- UnpossibleJim 4y ago
  The US could easily take much of that military funding and put it into infrastructure, job programs and healthcare spending and allow European countries to increase their military spending. This would keep our GDP and reduce our deficit with tax collection. Every time I suggest this, however, I seem to be downvoted into oblivion and poopooed by the Europeans on the forum. I guess a more isolationist policy isn't that great of an idea after all.
  - kranke155 4y ago
    I’m European and I fully understand that our free health care and giant social programs (on many countries) are paid for by our minuscule military spending - which turned out to be a terrible idea considering actually we live next to a revisionist and expansionist power. But Europeans liked to believe that WW2 had somehow “shown the world” that wars were unwinnable bla bla bla while really the US just installed a giant protectorate system on Europe and kept it under their nuclear umbrella (one which the continent largely decided to maintain after 1991). So yes, there are Europeans who understand (and should) that European prosperity was bought with an American military umbrella, one which we don’t pay for. But - the Trumpian argument that this architecture is “useless” is also wrong in my view. The system was constructed to benefit the US, and so it did. The problem is that after 1991 everyone got sloppy, and capital took enormous control over politics of the US and the West in general (since there were no enemies but only “opportunities for investment”) and this led to a series of poorly thought out disasters - including China in GATT/WTO hoping it would democratize, etc.
    - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
      Don't get me wrong, I'm no Trumper, and don't think we should leave NATO. But the US military expansionist policy is tiresome for the US as well as for the European population who complain about it. There are a vocal minority (maybe not even a minority) who want our young men and women to come home and have our spending aimed towards education, our crumbling infrastructure, clean energy, climate cleanup, paying down our national debt, health care and fixing social security. Those are just the top things, there are other items to do that don't involve violent expansion or nation building. We don't mind working with NATO for peace keeping missions, though. Those seem to have broad support, but the media's spell seems to have been broken for a while on this rah rah, invade every country for any manufactured reason so the few can make billions =[
      - kranke155 4y ago
        I agree in a sense. As far as US military expansionism - I think the overall security architecture is sound (NATO, AUSUKNZ, Four Eyes and Japan/South Korea means that the US effectively surrounds all of its major challengers on all sides). It’s kept US dominance in place for almost a century now. And I believe that’s a good thing. But it’s on the implementation that things went haywire. Because pre-fracking the US was so dependent on foreign energy, adventurism was encouraged in Iraq which led to a major geopolitical disaster (and a huge sink for the country’s resources). In that respect, yes the expansionist policy went totally overboard, due to poor leadership and planning and unrealistic political objectives. Overall I think: - the overall architecture is sound. The US dominates and reaps benefits for it, while in my opinion maintaining peace through strength - but Europe should be spending enormous amounts more in military power - something like 5% of GDP at least - so it has a realistic chance to defeat Russia on the battlefield on its own - if that happened then the US could probably reduce its military spending (im not even sure they would because of the issues you listed though).
nradov 4y ago
It's easy to game military spending metrics depending on what you choose to include. For example, some countries include pension payments for retired veterans and others do not.
Consultant32452 4y ago
The US spends more than anyone on healthcare as a percentage of GDP and gets mediocre results at best. The most frequently proposed solution to this is to turn over more of the control of our healthcare to the people who created the current system and also lied us into the Iraq war where we killed millions of people for corporate profits.

pydry 4y ago

I remember about a decade ago I was living in Singapore and there was a minor controversy coz the country appeared near the bottom of some "happiness" country ranking. A lot of people felt vindicated by this. The government got really mad and decided, in true Singaporean fashion that the only logical solution was to create their own metric and ranking. One where, coincidentally they were #1/#2 happiest instead of #1/2 unhappiest. A completely different set of people felt equally vindicated by this.

rrrrrrrrrrrryan 4y ago

I'd argue that politicians have completely gamed the U-3 unemployment rate based on their positions toward gig work, part time work, minimum wage, etc. The various unemployment metrics used to be highly correlated, but they've diverged in recent decades. And you can absolutely dial up GDP without dialing up median income per capita as well.