Edmonton, Canada – Genuine Well-being Index

The overall results of the Edmonton GPIs for a single year are set up using a 1-100 index system, so that 48 wellbeing indicators can be compared to each other and across time, indexed based on a base year (1981) or an optimum wellbeing condition for each indicator over time.

The analysis also contrasts Edmonton’s real GDP per capita with a composite Edmonton Wellbeing Index – comprising all 48 economic, social and environmental indicators — as well as the sub-aggregated Economic, Social, Environmental Indices.

The results showed that between 1981 and 2008, Edmonton’s real GDP per capita has risen, albeit irregularly, while the Edmonton Wellbeing Index rose slightly in the early mid-1980s above the 1981 benchmark year, peaked in 1983 then declined steadily hitting a low in 1998. Since 1998, the overall Edmonton Wellbeing Index has been steadily increasing though has not yet reached the 1981 benchmark-year level.

The strategic planning department along with the Chief Economist, found the GPIs/Wellbeing Index very useful for tracking overall economic, social, health and environmental well-being conditions and trends providing decision makers with a high-level overview of well-being of the city providing important context to policy and budgetary decisions and providing citizens with a high-level wellbeing profile. Another key feature of the GPIs was that it provided City strategic planners and analysts the capacity to assess the interrelationships and correlations between key economic indicators and social, health and environmental indicators of well-being. This provided decision makers to conduct ‘what-if’ future projections of well-being. Ultimately it was possible to link well-being indices to municipal programs and services to ascertain impacts and value for municipal capital and operating spending.

Unfortunately, in April of 2012 the Mayor and Council, with recommendations by the City’s Chief Financial Officer, voted against maintaining the Edmonton Wellbeing Index indices for the purposes of informing annual budgeting. This was unfortunate since in 2012, Bhutan had recommended the adoption of a new economic paradigm based on well-being and happiness (The Gross National Happiness Index), to UN members and nations.

Is there a lasting legacy of the Edmonton GPI work?

While the formal Edmonton GPI work and updates to the indicator set ended in 2012, the lasting impact of measuring well-being impacts of policies, programs and services has taken on greater importance in Edmonton. Two examples include the End Poverty Edmonton initiative that resulted in a well-being impact evaluation framework developed for the City of Edmonton that would be the basis of measuring well-being impacts of the various poverty reduction strategies and actions.

A second example of well-being impact analysis is the development of a well-being assessment system for Edmonton’s Capital Region Housing Corporation, which provides affordable housing to 9,000 low-income Edmonton households. Well-being became central to CRHC’s mission statement. A well-being perceptional impact analysis survey was piloted by Anielski with a sample of CRHC residents providing a well-being baseline upon which to measure the future impacts of CRHC’s buildings and programs based on lived well-being experience and perceptions. So, well-being-based decision making has found life within policy portfolios and other programs of the City of Edmonton.

During the period of the Covid-19 pandemic, the City of Edmonton and a new mayor and council, have expressed renewed interest in restoring the GPIs and are interested in exploring a new well-being accounting and reporting system. A suggestion has been made for the City to experiment with a combination of objective well-being indices complimented by a citizen well-being survey of subjective well-being to inform future decision making.

Find out more here.

Find out more: