Measuring Well-being and Societal Progress - Beyond GDP

Chart 7. Real annual change in household disposable income for different values of the coefficient of aversionto inequalityAverage annual growth rate, 1995 to 2002-3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6AUSCANAversion to inequality = 0Aversion to inequality = 1Aversion to inequality = 10DNKFRAGRCITAMEXNZLPOLESPTURUSAOECD-23Note: National values of “equally-distributed” household disposable income are computed as the average of the values for eachdecile, using coefficients of aversion to inequality of 0, 1 and 10, respectively. Levels of household disposable income for each decileare computed as the product between national-account estimates of household disposable income, adjusted for household size, andsurvey-based estimates of the ratio between the disposable income of each decile to the mean. Data for household disposableincome are converted into a common currency using purchasing power parities (PPPs) for private consumption expenditures; data forGDP per capita are based on PPPs for GDP.Source: Calculations based on OECD national accounts and OECD questionnaire on income distribution and poverty.Over the last 10-15 years, international statisticians have extended the boundaries of national accountsto include environmental phenomena. Particularly important has been the publication in 2003 of theSystem of Economic and Environmental Accounts (SEEA) by the European Commission, the InternationalMonetary Fund, the OECD, the United Nations and the World Bank. More recently, the work of the“London Group” (on environmental accounts – water, etc.) and of the OECD (on material flows accounts)15