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60 ANALYSIS AND PROSPECTIVE STUDIES CULTIVAR Issue 22 APRIL 2021 At the more macro level, the budget process and the allocation of resources represent a powerful mech- anism to broaden decision making “beyond GDP”. This includes monitoring a dashboard of well-being indicators to frame (ex ante) the budget discussion, and to complement the standard economic and fis- cal reporting that typically accompanies the budget. Steps in this direction have been taken in France since 2015 (the “New Wealth indicators”, led by the Prime Minister’s Office); in Italy since 2017 (the “Economic and Financial Document“, led by the Ministry of the Economy and Finance) and in Sweden also since 2017 (“New Measures for Well-being”, developed by Statistics Sweden and coordinated by the Ministry of Finance). In some countries (e.g. Italy), budget pro- posals are also assessed for their expected impact on different well-being outcomes over a certain period, as compared to a business-as-usual scenario. In New Zealand, the government used an analysis of well-being evidence, including the Treasury’s new Liv- ing Standards Framework Dashboard, to identify five priorities for the 2019 “Wellbeing Budget”. At a more granular level, the New Zealand Treasury adapted their cost-benefit analysis template for ministerial submissions of spending proposals to explicitly include well-being and sustainability considerations. Focusing on a longer term perspective, well-being indi- cator dashboards have also been developed to reflect the way a country thinks about progress and what it means to have a good life today and in the future. Countries that have explicitly introduced well-being frameworks and indicators into their long-term strategic devel- opment planning, often aligned to the UN Sustaina- ble Development Goals, include Colombia (through “Presidential Dashboards” developed by the Minis- try for National Planning), Slovenia (in the Slovenian National Development Strategy 2030, adopted by the Slovenian Government in 2017), and Latvia 2030 (Sustainable Development Strategy of Latvia until 2030). Finally, some countries have created new institutional positions or structures topromote theuseof well-being evidence in government and to give a central place to well-beingmetrics in public policies. These institutions allow to break the silo approach that prevail in most countries, and promote an integrated view of objec- tives and means of reform implementation. Examples of the creation of specific high-level positions include the Future Generations Commissioner in Wales or the What Works Centre for Wellbeing in the United King- dom. New responsibilities can also be assigned as part of reforms to existing structures, such as giving the Treasury or Ministry of Finance a cross-cutting respon- sibility for well-being or sustainability, as has happened to some extent in New Zealand and Italy. Conclusions The 2009 Stiglitz-Sen-Fitoussi (SSF) report was hugely influential within the statistical community, leading to a range of national and international ini- tiatives to implement its recommendations. Almost 10 years later, two reports by the OECD-hosted “High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress” (HLEG) take stock of the developments in the ‘ Beyond- GDP’ agenda that were sparked by the SSF report and pro- vide a roadmap for the decade ahead. If measurement is the point of departure of these reports, their ambition goes much wider. Their central message is rather that “what we meas- ure affects what we do. If we measure the wrong thing, we will do the wrong thing. If we don’t measure something, it becomes neglected, as if the problem didn’t exist” . In other terms, measurement issues are not only techni- cal, but go to the root of how our democratic system functions. This is not to dismiss the importance of GDP, which is a critical measure for assessing economic conditions and the effects of a range of policies. But GDP keeps being used for purposes that it was not designed to meet, … what we measure affects what we do. … measurement issues are not only technical, but go to the root of how our democratic system functions.