Measuring progress in terms of economic standards

Measuring progress in terms of economic standards

In his book, Charles Myers says (Human Resources Development Strategies), that human resources development processes are necessary to change the social systems sought by the regeneration nations, a goal that cannot be separated from the goal of economic growth in any realistic analysis.

Although, number of economists attach little importance to human investment and their efforts in economic theory, most economic development planners are little concerned with human resource analysis..

Although, they recognize that, some investments in education are economic, they directly lead to increased economic growth, but they consider that other spending on education and human resource development is primarily (social investment) and should be determined in the manner of the rest.

In fact, in practice, it is difficult for us to calculate the financial rate of return from any educational project in the same way as we calculate the return from a dam or factories, because it is difficult to ascertain how much is consumption and how much an investment .

The recent economic analyses of human investment, and an important contribution to economic theory, are not yet of little use to planners, in terms of their visibility of the general importance of education.

The suggestion that some of the costs of education can be considered an investment, not just a currant consumption or social expense, it is not surprising to learn that the weakest sections in almost all other economic development plans are those related to education, training and other aspects of people's development.

It is unlikely that we will advance much further. Unless we can accurately analyses human resources development processes, not just financial returns.

Efforts to further emphasize the importance of human resources and attempts to measure the contribution of education to economic growth are all constructive efforts preferential.

But the notion that human resource development can or should be analyzed only in economic terms is misleading. It is a mistake to assume that the main purpose of human resource development is to increase the human contribution to the creation of productive services and goods to the maximum extent possible.

It is contrary to reality that we measure the return from education in terms of increasing the incomes of individuals only, or increasing total income in the economic system.

It is certain that the increase in production should not be taken as the only measure of the effectiveness of human resource development.

However, economists as technical specialists tend to measure progress only in terms of economic standards, even if they are members of society with a broad view of the objectives of this society.

On the other hand, it is logical to say that education and other means of human development should be regarded as human rights, regardless of their contribution to the production of beneficial goods and services. Education for citizenship, education for adaptation to life, or education to raise the value of human beings are all legitimate objectives, but they are only partially the aspirations and hopes of modern societies. The purely human way of dealing with human resource development, like the limited economic method, distorts the true meaning of the hopes of modern human beings and modern societies.

In conclusion, I say:

Estimating the growth of human resources is the logical starting point for any growth analysis and keeping pace with the times.