A cartoon in the text shows two people watching television. On the screen are the words "Economic growth indicators are up, led by car repairs, divorce costs, open-heart surgeries, and toxic waste cleanups." The cartoon illustrates the:

a) Difficulty in measuring social welfare.

b) Difference between GDP and national income.

c) Problem of measuring the difference in wealth between the United States and other nations.

d) Difference between GDP and NDP.

The answer is A Difficulty in measuring social welfare.

Explanation:

GDP is usually used around the world as a standard measure of the well being and capabilities of a country to produce goods. When GDP is high a country has high levels of consumption, investment and government purchases and, in consequence high levels of supply and demand.

But GDP tells nothing about the types of products or selling of products or services a economy produces, and as in the case, production can be high in activities that show general bad levels of social welfare in the community. GDP does not capture this outcomes, making difficult to compare social welfare along nations because each one may have specific values or characteristics of adequate social welfare not related to consumption or levels of income as measured by GDP. Most importantly each country make have different definitions of social welfare.