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If I run around town smashing windows with a rock, GDP goes up. Computing value more accurately than financial markets is not difficult: the bar is on the floor.




If I run around town smashing windows with a rock, GDP goes up.

Not generally. Window repairmen get higher incomes, but the rest of the economy has less consumption and investment.


> If I run around town smashing windows with a rock, GDP goes up.

I don't believe that's true. I believe that's called the "Broken Window Fallacy" in Economics.


Breaking windows DOES increase GDP, just like the parent said. The argument ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window ) only argues that not all GDP increase is good, because of waste of resources, because of the opportunity cost. That's why measuring success only by GDP is a bad idea.



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