What is progess or development?

Question

What is progess or development?

Answer 1

People often get into arguments about what constitutes progress. Some say that what others regard as progress is not progress at all.

Some people evaluate progress in relation to their notion of an ideal state of the world, i.e. progress is defined as progress towards utopia. As you will see, I am not a utopian.

We bypass these arguments by considering a country or a section of a country to have progressed if people who have a choice move to it and adopt its ways - revealed preference, the economists call it. We give short shrift to arguments that people didn't know what they were doing when they made their choices. According to revealed preference, America is the most progressive country. So far as I know there is no other country that has more immigrants from America than America has immigrants from that country. By the way, many people move back and forth enough between America and the countries where they grew up so that the reasons for where they choose to live are based on a lot of information.

Some people misunderstand the claim that there is progress and there will be more and people will like it with a claim that in the glorious future, everyone will be happy. Nothing now known offers a way of making everyone happy. Kings were often dissatisfied, and the very rich of today have their dissatisfactions.

Revealed preference agrees pretty well with the common notions of progress.

Development describes the growth of humans throughout the lifespan, from conception to death. The scientific study of human development seeks to understand and explain how and why people change throughout life. This includes all aspects of human growth, including physical, emotional, intellectual, social, perceptual, and personality development.

The scientific study of development is important not only to psychology, but also to sociology, education, and health care. Development does not just involve the biological and physical aspects of growth, but also the cognitive and social aspects associated with development throughout life.

The study of human development is important in a number of subjects, including biology, anthropology, sociology, education, history, and psychology.

Most important, however, are the practical applications of studying human development. By better understanding how and why people change and grow, we can then apply this knowledge to helping people live up to their full potential

Answer 2

Progress or Development or Economic Growth :

Economic growth is the increase in value of the goods and services produced by an economy. It is conventionally measured as the percent rate of increase in real gross domestic product, or real GDP. Growth is usually calculated in real terms, i.e. inflation-adjusted terms, in order to net out the effect of inflation on the price of the goods and services produced. In economics, "economic growth" or "economic growth theory" typically refers to growth of potential output, i.e., production at "full employment," which is caused by growth in aggregate demand or observed output.

As an area of study, economic growth is generally distinguished from development economics. The former is primarily the study of how rich countries can advance their economies. The latter is the study of how poor countries can catch up with rich ones.

As economic growth is measured as the annual percent change of gross domestic product (GDP), it has all the advantages and drawbacks of that measure.