🎓 Doc Freemo 🇳🇱 @freemo@qoto.org

@youshouldknowthis@mastodon.social

> My point is we measure too frequently wellbeing with GDP and the stock markets.

GDP should never be used alone for well being. GDP and tons of other indicators all need to be considered to get the complete picture of where we are headed. But the GDP does a good job at giving us one (of a few) clues as to the health of the economy. So it is a major factor in measuring well being, even if not the only one.

> "quantifying things based on economy" What's your point and what do you mean?

That as a metric for the health of the economy, and by extention one important component of the well being of its people, it is a very important measure.

> BTW, Long term neither Harris or Trump are in power. So, attributing direct responsibility to the president for how the economy is doing without further context is misadvised at best.

I generally agree, while presidents do have large effects on economies it still needs to be taken into account as part of the bigger picture. In fact strictly by the numbers congress tends to have more long-term quantifiable effects on markets than presidents do. Though presidents have more of a temporary effect (decisions or statements will cause large temporary swings in response).

@QasimRashid

@youshouldknowthis@mastodon.social

Its all relative.. +/- 5% is pretty huge (even on equality) over the right time period... A change of that amount in anything on the order of a year or less is pretty big.

GDP is a measure of what is produced, with more people in jail or with injuries then those people are not int he workforce, not able to produce things, so GDP goes down, not up. This is true both int he long and short runs, people pulled out of the workforce has **immediate** effect on our ability to produce new foods and produce new wealth.

@QasimRashid

Do people actually care about her opinions outside of Harry Potter?

@TheOldGuy

Who exactly is firing them, UNRWA themselves? What else could they do, they cant arrest them, that would have to be israel that would have to do that no?

@TheOldGuy

Who exactly is firing them, UNRWA themselves? What else could they do, they cant arrest them, that would have to be israel that would have to do that no?

@rchusid While i lean liberal myself if harris picked a non-democrat I might actually vote for her just for showing an unusual ability to reach across aisles. That said as it stands right now I cant in my right mind bring myself to support Harris or Trump.

@youshouldknowthis@mastodon.social

Means mean very little when you have huge inequalities.

No doubt those inequalities are important to address. But having a healthier economy corresponds with fewer inequalities. Largely because you need a healthy financial situation to even address inequalities at all.

Prisons and car accidents also improve GDP and they are not good measures of how well the economy is doing.

No, they dont. While Prisons and Car accidents make certain people money (the owners of car repair shops and prisons) it also takes away significant amount of wealth that would have been produced by the people who are taken out of the work force. So no, in fact having more people in prison or in car accidents overall would reduce the GDP not increase it.

Of course, the stock market goes with the economy, but it’s not the president that commands either directly (or even indirectly, to any so great extend).

Absolutely agree on the point that it isnt the president in complete control of the stock market, so he is not 100% responsible for it. One must look at the nuance of the situation to figure out what effect he has had on it, we cant just assume. That said, he has been doing a poor job on economy in most of his time in office, so I think there is a pretty fair argument here to say Biden is shit on the economy, but thats a bit of a tangent and not really the important part here for me.

Can we please stop measuring our well-being with how much we destroy the planet?

Thats not what the stock market is, and long term even economic damage would hurt the stock market, so quantifying things based on economy, at least if you have a pretty good long-term outlook still works out even if we prioritize the environment (as we should).

@QasimRashid

@QasimRashid Stocks are in fact an excellent measure of economic health. In fact the correlation between mean income, GDP, and the stock market (when indexed correctly) is very very tightly correlated.

@CatDragon

If that were true you'd discuss the why and how in a constructive way rather than resort to the insults I'd expect of a toddler.

@WrenArcher @CoachMark @kamalaharrisforpresidentnews