Pitchfork Economics with Nick Hanauer The Measure of Progress: Counting What Really Matters (with Diane Coyle)
Nov 18, 2025
Diane Coyle, Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge and author of *The Measure of Progress*, joins the conversation to challenge traditional economic metrics. She argues that GDP misrepresents modern economies by equating harmful activities with positive contributions. Coyle advocates for a broader approach to measurement, including valuing unpaid work and using time-use surveys. She critiques the limitations of current dashboards and emphasizes the importance of understanding real progress to inform policy decisions.
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GDP Misses The Modern Economy
- GDP struggles to capture modern production like AI, crypto, and cross-border value chains.
- That mismatch gives misleading signals about trade, growth, and policy choices.
Trade Figures Hide Value Creation
- Final trade figures overstate where value is created because global supply chains split value across countries.
- Value-added statistics give a more accurate picture of who benefits from production.
GDP Is A Money-Centric Metric
- GDP is fundamentally a money metric that values only paid transactions and formal employment.
- That bias systematically ignores unpaid care, home production, and many digital activities.
