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IPS195 Peter van de Ven
accounts, Section 3 of this paper goes one major step further, by presenting
an outline of such a broader accounting framework, which is considered
practically feasible in a relatively short time period. Section 4 concludes with
some suggestions on the way forward in implementing such an approach.

2. Current initiatives closely related to the current system of national
accounts
One of the most influential initiatives to arrive at a better understanding
of well-being is the “Report by the Commission on the Measurement of
Economic Performance and Social Progress” by Joseph Stiglitz, Amartya Sen
and Jean-Paul Fitoussi (Stiglitz et al, 2009). The report contains various
recommendations, among which the first five are directly related to macro-
economic statistics, as follows:
1. When evaluating material well-being, look at income and consumption
rather than production.
2. Emphasise the household perspective.
3. Consider income and consumption jointly with wealth.
4. Give more prominence to the distribution of income, consumption and
wealth.
5. Broaden income measures to non-market activities.
The main thrust of these five recommendations is to not only look at
(developments in) GDP, but also to household disposable income, the
distribution of income, consumption and wealth, and the free services
provided by unpaid household activities (taking care of children and elderly
people, cooking meals at home, cleaning, etc.). As such, the Report also
recognises that the system of national accounts is much more than GDP alone,
a mistake that is often being made, if not explicitly then at least implicitly. The
system of national accounts contains a complete and consistent set of
accounts that describe all (economic) transactions and positions for
households, corporations, government, etc.
Importantly, the Report does not contain a recommendation to objectively
capture well-being in a single metric, by for example monetising all aspects
that have a positive or negative impact on well¬being. The same holds for
trying to capture (environmental) sustainability, by monetising all negative
externalities from economic activities on the environment. The Report
considers well-being as a multi¬dimensional phenomenon, and preference is
given, at least for the time being, to define the various aspects that affect well-
being, and then select indicators for monitoring the developments for each of
these aspects. As a follow-up to the 2009 Report, a High Level Expert Group
(HLEG), the secretariat of which was provided by the OECD, was set up in 2013
to continue the work of the Stiglitz-Sen-Fitoussi Commission. Their report
“Beyond GDP. Measuring what counts for economic and social performance”

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