Would you give up Google for $17,000 a year? The Federal Reserve wants to know

[steven36]

• The Fed is trying to figure out how much free internet services are worth to the economy.
• The answer could help the central bank solve one of the most puzzling paradoxes of the economy: The current expansion is the longest in history, yet productivity gains are weak and GDP growth, while steady, is far from stellar.
• Fed Chairman Jerome Powell has recently cited work by an MIT economist and other experts that suggests the median user would need about $48 to give up Facebook for one month, for example.
• "A bigger share of our economy is being missed by GDP," economist Erik Brynjolfsson says.

 

 

Jerome Powell, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve

 

WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve wants to know what the internet is worth to you.

 

The answer could help the central bank solve one of the most puzzling paradoxes of the modern economy: The current expansion is the longest in history, yet productivity gains are weak and GDP growth, while steady, is far from stellar.

 

In a speech this week, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell raised the possibility that the problem is with the data itself. GDP measures the value of products and services that are bought and sold. But many of the greatest technological innovations of the internet age are free. Search engines, e-mail, GPS, even Facebook — the official economic statistics are not designed to capture the benefits they generate for businesses and consumers.

 

"Good decisions require good data, but the data in hand are seldom as good as we would like," Powell said.

 

Instead, Powell cited recent work by MIT economist Erik Brynjolfsson, one of the leading academics on the intersection of technology and the economy. In a paper with Avinash Collis of the National Bureau of Economic Research and Felix Eggers of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, the authors conducted massive surveys to estimate the monetary value that users place on the tools of modern life.

 

The results? The median user would need about $48 to give up Facebook for one month. The median price of giving up video streaming services like YouTube for a year is $1,173. To stop using search engines, consumers would need a median $17,530, making it the most valuable digital service.

 

The authors also conducted more limited surveys with students in Europe on other popular platforms. One month of Snapchat was valued at about 2.17 euros. LinkedIn was just 1.52 euros. But giving up WhatsApp? That would require a whopping 536 euros. Twitter, however, was valued at zero euros.

 

"Over time, we're spending more and more of our waking hours interacting with the internet or using those services on our mobile phones," Brynjolfsson told CNBC. "A bigger share of our economy is being missed by GDP."

 

Brynjolfsson is advocating an entirely new measure of economic health that calculates benefit rather than output. He calls it GDP-B and estimates that the welfare gains from Facebook alone would have added 0.05 to 0.11 percentage points to its annual growth.

 

"What we really care about if we want to know how well off people are is the consumer surplus — how much benefit you get — not how much you actually pay," Brynjolfsson said.

 

Inside the Fed, a separate effort is underway to value the digital economy. Powell also highlighted research by David Byrne and Carol Corrado that uses the volume of data transmitted through broadband, cable and WiFi to estimate the value of online products and services. Their analysis shows that GDP would have been half a percentage point higher over a decade if the full scope of the digital economy had been incorporated.

 

"The highly visible innovations in consumer content delivery raises the question of whether existing national accounts are missing consequential growth in output and income associated with content delivered to consumers via their use of digital platforms," the authors say in their paper.

 

Powell delivered his speech at an annual convention of economists, where the theme was integrating old and new economies. At one point, Powell even waxed philosophical.

 

"How should we value the luxury of never needing to ask for directions?" he asked. "Or the peace and tranquility afforded by speedy resolution of those contentious arguments over the trivia of the moment?"

 

The answers to those questions may not be far off.

 

Source

[mp68terr]

10 minutes ago, steven36 said:

Would you give up Google for $17,000 a year?

Haven't use google itself for far more than that, prefer alternative search engines like startpage (even if it uses results from google) and duckduckgo.

As the article suggests, it would be difficult to stop using search engines in general.

[steven36]

1 hour ago, mp68terr said:

Haven't use google itself for far more than that, prefer alternative search engines like startpage (even if it uses results from google) and duckduckgo.

As the article suggests, it would be difficult to stop using search engines in general.

Really DuckDuckGo   is only used by those who are worried about there privacy  So it's not important enough  to the fed or the masses for them to even try and figure it out because it would be worth very little money in the  USA .

 

DuckDuckG gets about 36 million  searches per day world wide.

https://duckduckgo.com/traffic

 

While Google gets like 5.6 billion searches per day.world wide.

https://seotribunal.com/blog/google-stats-and-facts/

 

I use google search with there cookies blocked and ad-blockers UB0 , hosty and  autohosts  I  also use a instance of searx  ,DuckDuckGo and others  but what i do most people don't do.

 

[dhjohns]

I enjoy google because it automatically detects my location, and gives me more relevant results than other search engines.

[steven36]

1 hour ago, dhjohns said:

I enjoy google because it automatically detects my location, and gives me more relevant results than other search engines.

I use a vpn so it dont know my location . 🤣

 

 

[dhjohns]

Knowing my location is very important to me.  Like I said More Relevant Results.  When I am  looking for a place to buy something having google give me results in my area (Delaware City, DE) is far better than giving me results for, let's say, San Francisco.  LOL  

4 minutes ago, steven36 said:

I use a vpn so it dont know my location . 🤣

 

 

 

 

 

 

i use

Do   you think that men in black suits are going to come and snatch you up?

[steven36]

1 hour ago, dhjohns said:

Knowing my location is very important to me.  Like I said More Relevant Results.  When I am  looking for a place to buy something having google give me results in my area (Delaware City, DE) is far better than giving me results for, let's say, San Francisco.  LOL  

Do   you think that men in black suits are going to come and snatch you up?

No i pay good money so i  can  download in privacy every year so i may as well use it  to  hide my ip from scum   like Google there not the men in black  there noisy  big tech that dont have no business  knowing were i am the Feds already know who you are that's a big difference.  I lived without internet  30 years before i had it so In my world, the virtual hasn't quite taken over the physical.  what the the masses   use there search engine for is not what i use mine for even . You and me  are like Fire and water  were not even on the same page but that's cool  because the world would be boring if we all were exactly the same .  It up too you if you want to be unique and not do what the masses do at lest at home it is or if you just want to be like everyone else and do it or use it because they do. 

 

I don't like companies that try to force there will on me , but i'm not above using them but only on my terms not there's. I run the show in my life  and not Big Tech . If they block me terms  i use and alternative instead it's the www  no one company control it all  and they get sued for antitrust if they try. 

[funkyy]

$17,000 a year? I'd give up sex for that...well maybe only on Mondays.