Event—Public Programming

Measuring Worth

Economic historians, economists, journalists and the general public are always quoting monetary amounts in the past. The problem is that these monetary amounts only existed in the past, and to understand them today means we need a comparable amount in today’s prices. This talk will give several options as how to do it. We will show that there is nearly always more than one answer and that these answer(s) depends fundamentally on how the question is framed.