Ever since the Second World War, the performance of the economy - and the well-being of its people - has traditionally been measured using the gross domestic product. According to the conventional wisdom, rising GDP is a good thing. A declining GDP, by contrast, is bad news. Consumer spending falls, businesses go bust,jobs get lost, homes are repossessed and a chancellor who fails to respond appropriately is liable to find himself out of office. Little wonder then that Gordon Brown was so bullish when he addressed the nation on 17 March this year. Britain is enjoying its 'longest period of sustained growth for 200 years', according to the chancellor's 2004 Budget speech. The time accounting may be questionable. (It is barely possible to measure GDP accurately before the system of national accounts was in place). But Brown was basically right. We are living in a period of unprecedented prosperity.The national income has more than tripled in the course of only 50 years.
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