International Productivity Monitor (Apr 2010)
Aggregate Measures of Income and Output in Canada and the United States: Implications for Productivity and Living Standards
Abstract
The objectives of this article are to clarify definitions and to produce estimates of the eight aggregate measures of income and product (gross domestic product, gross domestic income, gross national product, gross national income, net domestic product, net domestic income, net national product and net national income) for Canada and the United States over the 1980-2008 period. The article also discusses the implications of the eight measures for productivity and living standards analysis. It concludes that GDP and NDP are the most appropriate measures of output for productivity analysis, while NNI is the most appropriate measure of income for the analysis of living standards because it captures the impact on real income of terms of trade changes, net income received from abroad, and the sustainability of the capital stock.
