Factor in natural capital, and China's growth rate plunges
The Chinese economy is big but a lot smaller than many think, if the impact of its
growth on the country's environment and people is taken into consideration
Tom Holland
Updated on Jun 22, 2012
Ask any 10 Hongkongers where they think China ranks in the economic league table
of different countries, and the chances are that all 10 will give you the same answer.
"Second," they will say, "behind the United States but gaining fast".
And they will be right - up to a point.
China is indeed the world's second-largest economy measured by gross domestic product,
and has been since 2010, when it overtook Japan in the country league table.
The trouble is that GDP is a lousy way to rank economies.
It was adopted during the second world war as a handy measure of how many guns, ships
and planes the US economy was able to produce, and it's been the standard gauge of
economic strength ever since.
But while GDP tells you the quantity of stuff you churn out each year, it tells you
nothing about the quality of your economic development.
For example, GDP fails entirely to account for the costs of environmental damage
inflicted in the pursuit of ever greater output growth.
So if a pulp and paper plant produces $1 million worth of toilet rolls, $1 million gets
added to GDP. No deduction is made for the natural forest that was felled to provide
the lumber. And no allowances are made for the dioxins the plant pumped into the local
river, poisoning fisheries, tainting meat and dairy products and polluting the drinking
water of millions.
This is a critical omission. If our pulp and paper plant produces a million dollars of
toilet rolls, but causes $400,000 of agricultural losses and creates $600,000 of future
health-care costs, the net economic gain is not $1 million, but zero.
Nowhere is this shortcoming of GDP as an economic measure more glaring than in China.
A few years ago, the State Environmental Protection Administration did try to factor
pollution costs into the country's GDP figures. But when it found that including
environmental costs would have reduced growth by at least a third, the attempt was quickly stopped.
Now, to coincide with the Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development,
the UN has had a stab at coming up with a new measure of economic development that includes
not just GDP-style output of goods and services, but also measures of human and environmental capital.
Human capital covers education, health and mortality, workforce participation and employment.
Environmental, or natural, capital accounts for a range of factors, including agricultural land
and productivity, mineral and energy resources, and pollution costs.
The result is the UN's new Inclusive Wealth Index, and the view it gives of economic development
is startlingly different from the picture painted by GDP.
The discrepancy is especially pronounced when it comes to China. Whereas China's GDP has
grown at an average 10 per cent rate since 1990, only modest growth of human capital
and a steady deterioration in natural capital mean that China's inclusive wealth has only
grown at an average 3 per cent rate over the same period.
To put that another way, while China's GDP leapt six times over between 1990 and 2008,
the country's inclusive wealth grew by only two-thirds (see the first chart).
As a result, while China's economy is still big, in relative terms it is a lot smaller than
most people think. On the UN's measure, the US is by far the world's biggest economy,
with an inclusive wealth of US$118 trillion in 2008. Japan comes second with US$55 trillion,
while China manages only third place, with an inclusive wealth of US$20 trillion, roughly
the same as Germany.
On a per capita basis, the gap is even starker. China's inclusive wealth per head is
just US$15,000. That's less than half South Africa's and just 4 per cent of the US level.
Now, no doubt there are all sorts of objections to the UN's new index. But it does make
one thing abundantly clear: GDP is a deeply flawed measure of genuine development
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格差不満で犯行か 重要会議控え警戒 Name 名無し 13/11/06(水)23:20:26 IP:122.103.*(vectant.ne.jp) No.736463 del 28日10:32頃消えます[返信]
中国山西省太原市の省共産党委員会前で発生した連続爆発事件で公安当局は６日、貧富の格差や社会的不公正に不満を持つ人物による犯行の可能性があるとみて本格捜査に入った。
… 中国空軍、24機のJH-7A戦闘爆撃機を日本に最も近い空軍基地に配備か[12/4] Name 名無し 13/12/04(水)17:04:25 IP:219.164.*(plala.or.jp) No.740920 del
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Germany Upset with U.S., Merkel in China, signed agreements of trade.... No dollar to be used? China signs Yuan trade agreement with France and Luxembourg
違法操業の中国漁船を曳航中、中国公船が体当たりで奪取 インドネシア抗議 Name 名無し 16/03/22(火)00:01:20 No.402947 del 4月22日頃消えます[返信] インドネシアのスシ海洋・水産相は２０日、違法操業していたとして検挙、曳航（えいこう）中だった中国漁船が中国公船に奪われたとして、中国政府に漁船の引き渡しと違法操業の中止を求め、抗議すると発表した。南シナ海で続く中国とフィリピンやベトナムとの衝突が、領有権問題では「中立」の立場をとるインドネシアにも拡大した格好だ。インドネシアのメディアが２１日、一斉に報じた。
中国漁船が摘発されたのは、南シナ海の南端に位置するインドネシア領ナトゥナ諸島沖で、インドネシアの排他的経済水域（ＥＥＺ）。中国は、ナトゥナ諸島はインドネシアに帰属するとしているが、南シナ海のほぼ全域の管轄権を主張する根拠としている「九段線」の一部とこのＥＥＺが重複している。
中国人はなぜ海外で「お断り」されるのか―中国人学生 Name 名無し 16/03/20(日)22:23:41 No.402820 del 4月21日頃消えます[返信] 「最近悲しかったことは何？」と聞かれたら、あなたはどう答えるだろうか。私は、「中国人お断りのホテルやレストランが海外に出現したこと」と答える。「私は何も悪いことしてないのに、何で？」この事実をインターネットで知った時、心の中で私はそう叫んでいた。 日頃生活していて、私が目にする公共マナーに関して問題がある中国人の行動には、次のようなものがある。1つ目は、路上に痰を吐き放題であること。とにかく汚い。2つ目は、バスが来ると列が崩れ、一斉にバスに群がること。バスを先頭で待っていても、うっかりすると最後になってしまう。3つ目は、公共の場で親が所構わず子どもに小便をさせること。日本なら、路上が濡れていたら「誰かが水をまいたのだろう」と考えるだろう。でも中国では、「子どもの小便だろう」と考えるのが普通なのである。そして、4つ目は、どんな場所でも大声で電話すること。… 無題 Name 名無し 16/03/20(日)22:57:56 No.402823 del
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