The measure has its roots in the Great Depression and World War II. At first, the priority was tracking the ups and downs of the business cycle in the 1930s. Then military planners needed a better way to assess productive capacity. The result was gross national product (GNP). It was replaced in 1991 by GDP, which measures production in the U.S. as opposed to production by Americans.
In recent years, there have been many clever metrics developed to displace GDP, but like all statistics, each has its flaws. And principally, whether it is the HDI, GGDP, or the GPI, none can be measured with the frequency, reliability and impartiality of GDP.
