What makes a good society? A case study on Greece | Michael Green | TEDxThessaloniki

In his talk, Michael Green presents the findings of his research regarding the Social Progress Index in Greece. Traditionally, happiness is measured in terms of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and it is believed that the higher the GDP is, the happier the people are. This is not the case though. What he tells us is that money does not bring happiness. It is other factors that make a society happy, that make a society “good". In order to measure happiness, he takes into account three key areas of well-being, i.e. human basic needs, foundations of well-being, and opportunity. His research showed that the position of Greece is relatively high in the Social Progress Index. Green tells his audience that social progress depends on our choices, not GDP, and urges everyone to “choose to live in good societies where everyone has the opportunity not just to survive, but to thrive”.

Michael Green is Executive Director of the Social Progress Imperative. An economist by training, he is co-author (with Matthew Bishop of ‘The Economist’) of Philanthrocapitalism: How Giving Can Save the World and The Road from Ruin: A New Capitalism for a Big Society. Previously Michael served as a senior official in the U.K. Government’s Department for International Development, where he managed British aid programs to Russia and Ukraine and headed the communications department. He taught Economics at Warsaw University in Poland in the early 1990s. His TED Talks have been viewed more than 1.8 million times, and his 2014 Talk was chosen by the TED organization as one of the ‘most powerful ideas’ of 2014 and by The Telegraph as one of the 10 best ever. Michael is @shepleygreen on Twitter.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

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