Homework Question Comparing Japan with UK

[paulineward]

My daughter has been set a question from college, has googled but not found sufficient information. Could anybody help please. The question is...GNP per capita in Japan was almost twice that of UK in 1996. Discuss how reliable this indicator is as a comparative measure of living standards in the 2 countries....now if you understand that because I don't! could anyone give her some suggestions. We would be very grateful.

[paulineward]

Sorry...should have said she needs to find about 3 things e.g. pollution to give as examlples

[Dassie]

In plain English .... the Gross National Product ( output ) per person in Japan was almost twice as much as a person in the UK . So if that was the case she needs to look at 1) How many unemployed in Japan as a percentage of the population compared to the UK. 2) Look at Exports in monetary terms of both Countries 3) How much money each Govt. ploughed back into the Country's infrastructure ( road building, hospitals etc ).
If Japan' GNP per capita was twice that of the UK you should find that UK had more unemployment than Japan, exported less and spent less on infrastructure so theoretically Japan would be better of standards wise than UK. Well that's how I'd approach it, but then I went to college many many years ago!

[paulineward]

Thanks Dassie...will pass this on to my daughter. Long time since I was in college too!

[jno]

there's some discussion halfway down here (and a good deal of total gibberish)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_national_pr oduct

[isj032]

Dassie got all the complicated stuff outta the way, as for a little more on the structure of your discussion:
Might have to consider the cost of living over there compared to here, very expensive property/land over there, long working hours. Cosider social, economic, environmental,demographical, legal, technological etc factors. The relative density, land mass/area compared with the UK. With possibly the most important being economic, social, environmental. Try to find a report online detailing the comparative demographics of the two countries for that year. (socio-economic factors). Not to forget your daughter is to evaluate the accuracy of the DATA given. I have suggested alternatives, she should consider the reliability of the data as an indicator in terms of: Accuracy, timeliness(up-to date?), relevance, etc.
Is gross just afer tax or is this after average expenditure?
If the former then the preceeding stuff comes into play if the former then this will be easier to discern.

[isj032]

Oh yeah.. find out the expendable income for two countries accross the social classes, hope that is useful.

[jump79]

Using GNP alone is not a completely reliable method of comparing living standards between the 2 countries.

Compare Price levels and Inflation too as GNP may have risen in one country but then if prices rose too, overall not much has changed really and in fact, Cost of living may actually have gone up.

Overall living standard could also be detected by looking at the economic growth rate of both economies during a certain point in tme, ie- for that year 1996.

And as Dassie already mentioned, population and population growth rate are another factor to consider in comparing standard of living between the 2 countries.

[jump79]

* Sorry, not pop. growth rate but the proportion employed out of the total pop. and overall employment rate

[isj032]

Disposable income btw not expendable!
Also the sample data/case study for the question is set in 1996, is the answer to be in reflection of the two countries then or as they are now?

[paulineward]

Thanks to you all for taking the trouble to anser..she is now on track with it. Thanks again