Economic Indicators

Lately, i've been reading a non-fiction book about the what the world is going to be like in the year 2020. It's not a futuristic adventure, nor is a rant about the apocalypse. It's a very interesting books that brings up many interesting points.

Its clear from all the information gathered that it's a very well researched book. All the predicitions the author makes seem just and practical, mainly because he's careful to cite releveant figures, explain trends, and form realistic conclusions.

The book is called The World in 2020: Power, Culture and Prosperity. It's written by Hamish McRae, a journalist and editor of the London Independent.

I agree with much of what McRae has to say, except for one thing: his use of economic indicators.

Top assess a country's wealth and standard of living, McRae takes the number of refridgerators a nationa has, then divides that number by its population. He says that refridgerators are good indicators because only the very wealthy can afford an expensive machine that keeps their food chilled. I somewhat agree to that, but I think it's not the most accurate indicator.

Why? Because surely they have refridgerators in Zambia.

Personally, I think that lawn gnomes are the best indicators of a nations wealth. I think the number of lawn nomes a country has cumulatively, should be divided by its population.

I say this because only the very wealthy can afford to spend their income on small ceramic statues of Norse fairytale creatures. For the most part, these figurines, or statues, or whatever you want to call them, are hidden away in the garden, or placed in the middle of the lawn in order to make passer-bys think that there are mythical dwarves dwelling at that particular household.

Regardless of where they are, they're going to get stolen.

Only the very wealthy are dumb enough to spend their money on something they know will get stolen, and only the very wealthy are dumb enough to support nordic cultures in any way.

Stupid wealthies.