In stark contrast with President Bush’s rosy economic reports, the U.S. economy has actually stagnated since the late 1970s as income inequality, environmental degradation, and our flailing international position take their toll on real economic progress. This is one of the key findings the 2006 Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI) update. The GPI is an alternative economic accounting system that takes into account the costs associated with lost forests, farmland, and wetlands, pollution, disappearing family time, and capital exported abroad. …the 2006 update adds new sub-accounts tracking the economic benefits of higher education and the costs associated with carbon emissions and loss of primary forest cover because of the increasing importance of these factors.

News notes are courtesy of Southern Forests Network News Notes
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