An obsession with wealth
If instead of counting our money, we'd been considering our happiness, might the nightmare on Wall Street have never happened? If governments had been thinking about well-being rather than wealth, could we have avoided the global financial crisis?
These are questions posed in from a panel of experts including no less than five Nobel prize-winning economists - Joseph Stiglitz, Amartya Sen, Kenneth Arrow, James Heckman and Daniel Kahneman.
The brains had been assembled by President Sarkozy of France last year in the hope that they might come up with a better way of measuring social progress than simply looking at GDP.
Their conclusion on the credit crunch is that "the crisis is teaching us a very important lesson: those attempting to guide the economy and our societies are like pilots trying to steering a course without a reliable compass".
Some members of the "Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress" (CMEPSP) went further.
"They believe that one of the reasons why the crisis took many by surprise is that our measurement system failed us and/or market participants and government officials were not focusing on the right set of statistical indicators. In their view, neither the private nor the public accounting systems were able to deliver an early warning, and did not alert us that the seemingly bright growth performance of the world economy between 2004 and 2007 may have been achieved at the expense of future growth."
They argue that some of the boom was a "mirage"; profits based on a bubble of inflated prices; an economic success story that proved to be nothing of the kind. Panel members speculate that "had we had a better measurement system" then "governments might have taken early measures to avoid or at least to mitigate the present turmoil".
What all the commissioners agree on is that "the time is ripe for our measurement system to shift emphasis from measuring economic production to measuring people's well-being".
I have spent the last day or two preparing a report for tonight's News at Ten on whether, , there is any evidence that our values have changed.
Remember those claims that when the unsustainable bubble of consumerism went pop, we would emerge less self-absorbed and materialistic? I wanted to know whether there was any evidence that people were thinking harder about well-being and less about "stuff".
Because, if the CMEPSP is right, governments should change the way they think about progress. And that will only happen if they think voters can be convinced to think the same. In the heart of the City of London, I found myself in the middle of an open-air market. It wasn't selling fish or potatoes. "Fractional Life" was wooing bankers with the opportunity to own a share in a private jet, a racehorse or a sports car.
The organiser explained, that for the right money, I could have the equivalent of an Oyster Card for a "PJ". Like the fare system on London's tubes and buses, investors can swipe their personal jet card in and out when they use the Lear.
I sat in a shiny, silver Ferrari and talked to a man who thought the death of conspicuous consumption was some way off yet. The young tyros emerging from the mirrored cathedrals of capitalism would, he told me, be just like their predecessors in the 80s. Once the storm clouds of recession had lifted, it would be foot down on the throttle. Sunny days will be here again.
The academics in Paris yesterday suggested a rather more multi-dimensional social weather report. Yes, wealth, consumption and income are important, but if we want to understand how our society is progressing, we need to think about our well-being in other ways at the same time.
Health and education; how we spend our time at work and play; whether we have a political voice and enjoy good governance; the quality of our social connections and relationships; the environment both now and in the future; our insecurity, economic and physical - all these things are aspects of well-being which must be considered simultaneously in order to get a handle on how a society is progressing.
Turning all these aspects of our lives into one simple measure is an enormous challenge. It may even be impossible but, as we ponder the unhappiness that flows from the global financial crisis, President Sarkozy's Commission suggest we give it our best shot.
"Had there been more awareness of the limitations of standard metrics, like GDP, there would have been less euphoria over economic performance in the years prior to the crisis; metrics which incorporated assessments of sustainability (e.g. increasing indebtedness) would have provided a more cautious view of economic performance", argue some of the panel.
In the shadow of city sky-scrapers along the East End's Whitechapel Road, I met shoppers avoiding showers. Had they been changed by the credit crunch? Not one bit. They'd had to tighten their belts a bit but when things improved, it would be business (and shopping) as usual.
There are some who like to interpret the little good data we have on public attitudes to the recession as evidence that we are much more concerned about inequality. We are less tolerant of bankers' huge bonuses and more sympathetic to those surviving on welfare, .
But I wonder whether this is wishful thinking - a bit of focus group work dressed up as real public support for a High Pay Commission and the redistribution of wealth.
An Ipsos MORI survey question asked in 2006 and repeated after the credit crunch suggests little has really changed.
It is hard to unpick the permanent from the temporary. All recessions change the way we spend and save. It also brings many people into closer contact with others who are unemployed or on benefits making us, for the moment, more sympathetic.
But the idea that the global economic system's flirtation with disaster has made us reconsider what really matters in life - I think the evidence is pretty thin.
That being said, if the giant brains behind the CMEPSP could convince governments to employ more sophisticated measures of social progress, maybe that might feed into our consciousness and we would see a lasting change in our priorities.
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