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Med Jones (a.k.a. Med Yones) is an American economist. He is the president of International Institute of Management, a U.S. based research organization. His work at the institute focuses on economic, investment, and business strategies. [1]
Med Jones is one of few economists who predicted the Great Recession of 2008 caused by the burst of the United States housing bubble, the Subprime mortgage crisis and the financial crisis of 2007–2008. [2] [3] In a 2006 white paper, he listed three major U.S. economic risks for the decade between 2007 and 2017. [4] The risks included the housing bubble and consumer debt, among the main risks to the US economy. [5] In March 2007, in a Reuters' Interview, he, again, said the impact of the subprime mortgages will not be limited to the housing sector, he warned about increased bankruptcies, stock market crash, and a loss of the confidence in the US economy. According to Reuters, “He said the bursting of the real estate bubble and high consumer debt were a major worry" and “if people started to think there may be a lot of bankruptcies (in the subprime lending market), then you’re going to see the stock market sell-off.” More importantly, he explicitly warned about a much worse economic crisis as a result of the subprime mortgages, stating that “The worst thing that could happen to any economy is the loss of confidence”. [6]
In 2007 the Federal Reserve was still blind to the impact of the housing bubble and subprime crash. In August 2007, the New York Federal Reserve reported that for the most part, Bear Stearns' (mortgage-related financial) problems did not pose a substantial risk to the economy. [7] The Fed Chairman stated that: "The housing market has looked a bit more solid, and the worst outcomes have been made less likely". In May 2008. In a congressional testimony, the Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said he saw only a "limited" impact of subprimes on "the broader housing market." [8]
In 2009, top economists and some Nobel laureates in Economics, came under criticism for defending their failure to see the crisis, stating that the economic crisis was unpredictable. [9] According to Wharton University, "What made it worse is that not only the top economists failed to predict it, they positively denied that it will happen." [10]
Economic forecasting is the holy grail of investing. Wall Street spends billions of dollars on economic research and analysis. [11] Accurate economic forecasting is regarded by academics and investors to be next to impossible. Yet, sometimes some analysts emerge with a specific view that contradicts the mainstream and with exceptional accuracy they prove the most respected economists and investors wrong. Among the economists who predicted the crisis, Jones' predictions are considered the most accurate. [12] [13] [14]
In 2010, President Barack Obama Administration and mainstream economists at leading think tanks, were focused on finding ways to restore"economic confidence". [15]
In 2015, seven years after the Great Recession, academic researchers presented a paper at the World Economic Forum explaining that economic confidence was not fully taken into consideration in academia and it was a major factor for recovery from great recession. [16]
Investors and investment advisers who follow Jones' predictions regard him among the prominent independent thinking money managers and economists. [17]
Despite having the most accurate forecasting record of the great recession and recovery, he advises investors against using his own forecasts. Jones believes economic forecasting is unreliable and Wall Street is a casino. In one interview, he says "I do not advise anyone to invest based on my outlook of the economy. The truth is that when people invest on Wall Street, they are essentially making bets about the future.” In addition, although he is known for his work on economics, he tries to distance himself from the economic profession. [18]
Mr. Jones is credited with the introduction of the first Gross National Happiness Index (GNH Index) in 2005, also known as Gross National Well-being Index (GNW Index). [19] [20]
In 2006, he published a white paper titled the American Pursuit of Unhappiness calling on policymakers, economists and researchers implement the first GNH Index framework. [21] [22] The initiative was widely referenced by academic and research papers citing the GNH index as a model for economic development and measurement. [23]
The term Gross National Happiness (GNH) was coined in 1972 by Sicco Mansholt one of the Founding Fathers of the European Union and the fourth president of the European Commission. GNH is often misattributed to Bhutan's fourth King, Jigme Singye Wangchuck who popularized the concept in the late 1990s. [24] The GNH philosophy suggested that the ideal purpose of governments is to promote happiness. The philosophy remained difficult to implement due to the subjective nature of happiness and the lack of exact quantitative definition of GNH [25] and the lack of a practical model to measure the impact of economic policies on the subjective well-being of the citizens.
The purpose of the GNH Index was to create a new metric as an alternative to the traditional GDP indicator, the new metric would integrates subjective and objective socioeconomic development policy framework and measurement indicators. The GNH Index was designed to transform the first generation abstract subjective political mission statement into a second generation implementation holistic (objective and subjective) concept and by treating happiness as a socioeconomic development metric. The proposed metric measures socioeconomic development by tracking seven wellness development areas: economic, environmental, physical, mental, workplace, social, and political via objective data and subjective results via survey. [26] GNH value is proposed to be an index function of the total average per capita. In the same year, he published a global GNH Index survey blueprint that can benchmark the subjective well-being in different countries, correlate happiness levels with differences in local policies to help identify best practices and major socioeconomic policy issues. The first Global Gross National Happiness Index Survey was launched in 2005. [27]
After the introduction of GNH index initiative in 2005, several initiatives were launched that adapted the gross national happiness index to their community.
In a report (2012) prepared for the US Congressman Hansen Clarke, R, Researchers Ben, Beachy and Juston Zorn, at John F. Kennedy School of Government in Harvard University, recommended that "the Congress should prescribe the broad parameters of new, carefully designed supplemental national indicators; it should launch a bipartisan commission of experts to address unresolved methodological issues, and include alternative indicators." They proposed that the government can use the survey results to see which well-being dimensions are least satisfied and which districts and demographic groups are most deficient, so as to allocate resources accordingly. The report list the Gross National Happiness Index and its seven measurement area as one of the main frameworks to consider. [28]
In 2007 Thailand releases the Green and Happiness Index (GHI). [29]
In 2009, in the United States, the Gallup poll system launched the happiness survey and collected data on a national scale. [30] The Gallup Well-Being Index was modelled after the GNH Index framework of 2005. [31] The Well-Being Index score is an average of six sub-indexes that measures life evaluation, emotional health, work environment, physical health, healthy behaviours, and access to basic necessities. In October 2009, the USA scored 66.1/100.
In 2010 the Bhutan GNH Index was conducted for the first time, the Bhutan GNH Index is similar to the first GNH Index created by Med Jones. [32]
In 2011 UN General Assembly Resolution 65/309, titled "Happiness: towards a holistic approach to development". [33]
In 2011 Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) launches "Better Life Index" (BLI). [34]
In 2011 Canadian Index of Wellbeing Network (CIW Network) releases The Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW). [35]
In 2011, a leading Israeli newspaper, Haaretz , published an article suggesting that western GDP economics is an incomplete development model and called for the adoption of Bhutan's GNH philosophy and Jones' GNH Index in Israel. [36]
In 2012, the city of Seattle in Washington, launched its own happiness index initiative, emphasizing measures similar to the GNH Index. [37]
In 2012 South Korea Launched Happiness Index citing the GNH Index framework. [38]
In India, Government of Goa 2030 Vision and Roadmap in (2012) cited the GNH Index as a model for measuring happiness. [39]
In 2014 The government of Dubai launched its localized Happiness Index to measure the public's contentment and satisfaction with different government services. [40]
In 2014 the United Kingdom launched its own well-being and happiness statistics. [41]
In 2012 Professor Peter T. Coleman, a world-renowned director of the International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution at Columbia University, suggested that Jones' GNH Index initiative could inform the Global Peace Index Initiative GPI. [42]
Other noteworthy Happiness Index initiatives that followed the GNH Index of 2005 are the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development OECD Better Life Index in 2011, World Happiness Report in 2011 and the Social Progress Index SPI in 2013.
Med Jones is identified as an independent in his profile on Wall Street Economists. [43]
Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced and rendered in a specific time period by a country or countries. GDP is often used to measure the economic health of a country or region. Definitions of GDP are maintained by several national and international economic organizations, such as the OECD and the International Monetary Fund.
Quality of life (QOL) is defined by the World Health Organization as "an individual's perception of their position in life in the context of the culture and value systems in which they live and in relation to their goals, expectations, standards and concerns".
The Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare (ISEW) is an economic indicator intended to replace the gross domestic product (GDP), which is the main macroeconomic indicator of System of National Accounts (SNA). Rather than simply adding together all expenditures like the GDP, consumer spending is balanced by such factors as income distribution and cost associated with pollution and other unsustainable costs. The calculation excludes defence expenditures and considers a wider range of harmful effects of economic growth. It is similar to the genuine progress indicator (GPI).
Gross National Happiness, sometimes called Gross Domestic Happiness (GDH), is a philosophy that guides the government of Bhutan. It includes an index which is used to measure the collective happiness and well-being of a population. Gross National Happiness Index is instituted as the goal of the government of Bhutan in the Constitution of Bhutan, enacted on 18 July 2008.
The Canadian Index of Wellbeing (CIW) is a composite index, composed of eight interconnected domains that measures stability and change in the wellbeing of Canadians over time. The CIW describes wellbeing as, "The presence of the highest possible quality of life in its full breadth of expression, focused on but not necessarily exclusive to: good living, standards, robust health, a sustainable environment, vital communities, an educated populace, balanced time use, high levels of democratic participation, and access to and participation in leisure and culture". The CIW acts as a companion measure of societal progress to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which is based solely upon economic productivity.
The Human Poverty Index (HPI) was an indication of the poverty of community in a country, developed by the United Nations to complement the Human Development Index (HDI) and was first reported as part of the Human Development Report in 1997. It is developed by United Nations Development Program which also publishes indexes like HDI It was considered to better reflect the extent of deprivation in deprived countries compared to the HDI. In 2010, it was supplanted by the UN's Multidimensional Poverty Index.
Environmental goods are typically non-market goods, including clean air, clean water, landscape, green transport infrastructure, public parks, urban parks, rivers, mountains, forests, and beaches. Environmental goods are a sub-category of public goods. Concerns with environmental goods focus on the effects that the exploitation of ecological systems have on the economy, the well-being of humans and other species, and on the environment. Users not having to pay an upfront cost and external factors like pollution that can damage environmental goods indefinitely are some of the challenges in protecting environmental goods.
The Happy Planet Index (HPI) is an index of human well-being and environmental impact that was introduced by the New Economics Foundation in 2006. Each country's HPI value is a function of its average subjective life satisfaction, life expectancy at birth, and ecological footprint per capita. The exact function is a little more complex, but conceptually it approximates multiplying life satisfaction and life expectancy and dividing that by the ecological footprint. The index is weighted to give progressively higher scores to nations with lower ecological footprints.
The economics of happiness or happiness economics is the theoretical, qualitative and quantitative study of happiness and quality of life, including positive and negative affects, well-being, life satisfaction and related concepts – typically tying economics more closely than usual with other social sciences, like sociology and psychology, as well as physical health. It typically treats subjective happiness-related measures, as well as more objective quality of life indices, rather than wealth, income or profit, as something to be maximized.
The National Human Development Reports (NHDR) take the Global Human Development Report approach to the national level and are prepared and owned by national teams. More than 540 national and sub-national HDRs have been produced so far by 135 countries, in addition to 31 regional reports.
The where-to-be-born index, formerly known as the quality-of-life index (QLI), was last published by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) in 2013. Its purpose was to assess which country offered the most favorable conditions for a healthy, secure, and prosperous life in the years following its release.
The green national product is an economic metric that seeks to include environmental features such as environmental degradation and resource depletion with a country's national product.
The Legatum Prosperity Index is an annual ranking developed by the Legatum Institute, an independent educational charity founded and part-funded by the private investment firm Legatum. The ranking is based on a variety of factors including wealth, economic growth, education, health, personal well-being, and quality of life.
UNESCO defined the Gender Parity Index (GPI) as a socioeconomic index usually designed to measure the relative access to education of males and females. It is used by international organizations particularly in measuring the progress of developing countries. For example, some UNESCO documents consider gender parity in literacy.
The Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) is an economic research centre within the Oxford Department of International Development at the University of Oxford, England, that was established in 2007.
Wikiprogress is a defunct online platform for sharing information on the measurement of social, economic and environmental progress. It is thought to facilitate sharing on ideas, initiatives and knowledge on "measuring the progress of societies". Like Wikipedia, it was open to all members and communities for contribution – anyone interested in "progress" could register.
Although for many decades, it was customary to focus on GDP and other measures of national income, there has been growing interest in developing broad measures of economic well-being. National and international approaches include the Beyond GDP programme developed by the European Union, the Better Lives Compendium of Indicators developed by the OECD, as well as many alternative metrics of wellbeing or happiness. One of the earliest attempts to develop such an index at national level was Bhutan's Gross National Happiness Index and there are a now a number of similar projects ongoing around the world, including a project to develop for the UK an assessment of national well-being, commissioned by the Prime Minister David Cameron and led by the Office for National Statistics.
Sabina Alkire is an American academic and Anglican priest, who is the director of the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI), an economic research centre within the Oxford Department of International Development at the University of Oxford, England, which was established in 2007. She is a fellow of the Human Development and Capability Association. She has worked with organizations such as the Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress, the United Nations Human Development Programme Human Development Report Office, the European Commission, and the UK's Department for International Development.
The World Happiness Report is a publication that contains articles and rankings of national happiness, based on respondent ratings of their own lives, which the report also correlates with various life factors. The report primarily uses data from the Gallup World Poll. As of March 2024, Finland has been ranked the happiest country in the world seven times in a row.
Gross National Well-being (GNW), also known as Gross National Wellness, is a socioeconomic development and measurement framework. The GNW Index consists of seven dimensions: economic, environmental, physical, mental, work, social, and political. Most wellness areas include both subjective results and objective data.