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On the fourth of January, 1934,

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A young man delivered a report

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to the United States Congress

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that 80 years on,

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still shapes the lives of
everyone in this room today.

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Still shapes the lives of
everyone on this planet.

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That young man wasn't a politician,

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he wasn't a businessman,

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a civil rights activist,

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or a faith leader.

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He was the most unlikely of heroes,

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an economist.

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(Laughter)

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His name was Simon Kuznets

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and the report that he delivered was called,

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"National Income, 1929-32"

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Now, you might think that

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this is a rather dry and dull report,

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and you're absolutely right.

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It's dry as a bone.

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But this report is the foundation

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of how, today, we judge the 
success of countries.

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What we know best as
Gross Domestic Product,

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or GDP.

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GDP has defined and shaped our lives

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for the last 80 years.

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And today I want to talk about 


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a different way to measure
the success of countries.

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A different way to define 
and shape our lives

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for the nest 80 years.

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But first, we need to understand

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how GDP came to
dominate our lives.

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Kuznet's report was delivered

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at a moment of crisis.

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The U.S. economy was plumetting

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into the Great Depression.

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and policy makers were 
struggling to respond.

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Struggling because they didn't
know what was going on.

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They didn't have data and statistics.

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So what Kuznet's report gave them

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was reliable data on what 
the U.S. economy

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was producing,

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updated year by year.

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And armed with this information,

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policy makers were, eventually,

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able to find a way out 
of the slump.

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And because Kuznet's invention

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was found to be so useful,

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it spread around the world.

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And now today, every country

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produces GDP statistics.

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But, in that first report,

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Kuznets himself delivered a warning.

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It's in the introductory chapter,

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page 7 he says,

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"The welfare of a nation can, therefore,

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scarcely be inferred

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from a measurement of 
national income

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as defined above."

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It's not the greatest soundbite 
in the world,

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And it's dressed up in the 
coursest language

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of the economist,

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but his message was clear,

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GDP is a tool

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to help us measure
economic performance.

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It's not a measure
of our wellbeing.

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And it shouldn't be a guide

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to all decision making.

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But we have ignored

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Kuznet's warning.

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We live in a world where

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GDP is the benchmark of sucess

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in a global economy.

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Our politicians boast when
GDP goes up,

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Markets move

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and trillions of dollars in capital

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move around the world

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based on which countries
are going up,

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and which countries 
are going down.

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All measured in GDP.

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Our societies have become

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engines to create more GDP.

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But we know that GDP is flawed.

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It ignores the environment.

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It counts bombs and prisons and progress.

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It can't count happiness

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or community.

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And it has nothing to say

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about fairness or justice.

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Is it any surprise,

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that our world,

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marching to the drumbeat of GDP,

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is teetering on the brink

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of environmental disaster

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and filled with anger and conflict?

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We need a better way


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to measure our societies.

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A measure based on the real things

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that matter to real people.