"How was life in 1820, and how has it improved since then? What are the long-term trends in global well-being? Views on social progress since the Industrial Revolution are largely based on historical national accounting in the tradition of Kuznets and Maddison. But trends in real GDP per capita...

This book is the latest report by the World Bank to estimate comprehensive wealth - including produced, natural and human / institutional assets - for over 100 countries. This ground-breaking report presents wealth accounts for 1995, 2000, and 2005, permitting the first longer-term assessment of...