從 GDP 到 GDE

From GDP to GDE

——如何切斷“規模—外匯—互害”的制度循環？

How to Cut the Institutional Loop of “Scale–Foreign Exchange–Mutual Harm”

錢 宏（Archer Hong Qian）

2026年1月30日·Vancouver

統一前言:為什麼我們必須重新思考“增長”的含義?

過去半個多世紀，人類文明幾乎達成了一個隱含共識：只要經濟規模在增長，問題終將被解決；只要 GDP 在上升，生活改善只是時間問題。

這一信念在工業文明的擴張階段曾經奏效。它支撐了戰後重建、基礎設施鋪展、全球貿易網絡的形成，也為數十億人口提供了脫離絕對貧困的現實路徑。

然而，進入 21 世紀第二個十年後，這一共識開始系統性失靈。

越來越多的國家與社會同時經歷着一種矛盾狀態：宏觀指標持續擴張，微觀體感卻持續收縮；規模能力不斷增強，生活確定性卻不斷下降；金融資產與外匯儲備屢創新高，家庭與社區卻普遍感到緊張、脆弱與不安。

這些現象並非孤立事件，也並非單一國家的治理失敗。它們跨越制度、文化與意識形態，呈現出高度相似的結構特徵。

這迫使我們提出一個過去被刻意迴避的問題：當“增長”本身不再自動帶來生活改善，問題究竟出在分配環節，還是出在我們衡量成功的方式本身？本組三篇文章，正是圍繞這一問題展開。

第一篇從制度與文明層面，揭示“無效 GDP”如何通過債務、通脹與計價權，形成一個可自我維持的閉環；

第二篇通過外匯與購買力平價的結構分析，說明為何宏觀規模優勢並不會自然轉化為普遍生活改善，反而可能外溢為國際層面的互害機制；

第三篇則嘗試回答一個更具建設性、也更具挑戰性的問題：如果問題不在增長本身，而在增長的價值參量，我們是否有可能改變這套參量？

這不是一組反增長、反市場、反全球化的文章。恰恰相反，它們試圖為增長、市場與全球協作，尋找一種不再依賴透支未來與轉嫁成本的繼續存在方式。

引言：問題已非“要不要增長”，而是“增長是否還值得被承認”

在前兩篇中，我們已經完成了兩件事：

第一，證明當代全球經濟的核心困境，並非周期波動，而是一套以規模為導向的價值核算體系已經失效；

第二，說明在這一體系下，即便出現“GDP 第二、PPP 第一、外匯儲備第一”的宏觀成就，也並不會自然轉化為普遍的生活改善，反而可能外溢為國際層面的互害機制。

至此，問題已經不在於“要不要增長”，而在於一個更根本、也更危險的問題：

我們是否仍然允許任何形式的增長，不加區分地被計入“成功”？

如果答案是肯定的，那麼無論換成金本位、銀本位、穩定幣本位，甚至換一種全球霸權貨幣，結果都不會改變——

規模會繼續擴大，生活卻繼續被擠壓；外匯會繼續增長，信任卻繼續流失。

這正是第三篇必須回答的問題：

如何在不否定市場、不依賴道德覺醒、不訴諸意識形態的前提下，讓制度本身失去“獎勵無效增長”的能力？

一｜問題的真正根源：不是貨幣錯了，而是“價值參量”錯了

我們習慣把經濟問題歸結為政策失誤、分配不公、外部衝擊，甚至歸結為某些國家或群體的“動機問題”。

但如果把視角抬高一個層級，就會發現一個更具解釋力、也更令人不安的事實：

當一個文明用“發生了多少交易”來替代“創造了多少價值”，那麼系統性失真不是偶然，而是必然。

GDP 的歷史功績不容否認。在工業文明階段，它成功地完成了一項艱難的任務：

用一個統一的貨幣標尺，把分散的生產與交換活動匯總成“規模能力”。

但問題在於：

這一“加法邏輯”，在 21 世紀已經無法識別三類關鍵事實：

a.哪些活動在透支未來的償付能力；

b.哪些增長在侵蝕家庭、社區與生態；

c.哪些“成功”只是把成本從當下推遲到未來、從組織轉嫁給個體、從中心轉移到外圍。

於是我們看到一種熟悉而危險的景象：

賬面繁榮持續存在，但生活體感持續惡化；規模不斷刷新紀錄，但社會信任與國際秩序卻同步下滑。

這並非治理能力不足，而是價值參量本身出了問題。

二｜GDE 的核心意義：不是替代 GDP，而是“審計 GDP”

共生經濟學提出的 GDE（Gross Development of Ecology / Gross Domestic Efficiency），常被誤解為“要用一個新指標取代 GDP”。

這是一個嚴重的誤解。

GDE 並不試圖否定 GDP 的存在價值，而是改變 GDP 的地位。

在 GDE 框架中，GDP 被明確地“降維”：

a.從“終極目標”，降為原始輸入流量；

b.從“成功本身”，降為需要被審計的成本項。

換句話說：

GDP 回答的是：發生了什麼？

GDE 回答的是：這些事情是否值得繼續發生？

這一轉變的關鍵，不在於加減法，而在於乘法過濾。

GDE 的基本結構可以概括為：

GDE = Σ（GDPᵢ × ηᵢ）

其中，η 並不是簡單的能效係數，而是一個綜合效能參數，至少同時包含三個維度：

a.對資源與能源效率的影響；

b.對社會福祉與生活確定性的影響；

c.對生態系統與未來承載力的影響。

當 η < 1，意味着這部分 GDP 雖然“發生了”，但在整體上稀釋了文明的真實價值；

當 η > 1，才意味着增長在放大社會的長期效能。

GDE 的目標不是製造“更好看的數字”，而是讓“無效增長在制度上變得不划算”。

三｜如何切斷“規模—外匯—互害”的制度迴路？

在第二篇中，我們已經用“文明診斷圖”清楚地展示了一個事實：

外匯之所以難以普惠，並非因為“不分配”，而是因為從進入、安置到轉化的每一個環節，都繞開了家庭與生活。

那麼，GDE 的介入，究竟改變了什麼？

1在“入口端”切斷無效增長的自動通行證

在 GDP 體系下，只要發生貨幣化交易，幾乎就擁有了“進入成功敘事”的通行證。

無論是低效基建、重複投資，還是以犧牲家庭與生態為代價的規模擴張，都可以被等價計入。

GDE 的第一項改變是：

不再允許“只憑規模”進入成功賬本。

當效能係數 η 成為必要條件時：

a.那些依賴透支未來、壓縮生活空間的增長，其賬面權重會被系統性折減；

b.那些真正改善生活、降低社會成本的活動，反而會獲得更高的價值權重。

這不是行政否決，而是價值審計。

2｜在“安置端”改變資本與外匯的流向邏輯

外匯與資本之所以長期“向外走、向上走”，並非因為決策者不關心民生，而是因為現行體系下：

改善生活的收益，往往無法在宏觀賬本中被充分識別。

GDE 改變的，正是這一“識別能力”。

當公共服務可及性、居民生活成本下降、生態修復等因素被明確計入效能參數，資本的最優配置方向就會發生變化：

a.投向家庭與社區，不再是“成本中心”，而是效能放大器；

b.投向生態修復，不再是“道德支出”，而是長期價值資產。

在這種結構下，外匯與資本不需要被“強制留在國內”，它們會在效能更高的地方自然沉澱。

3｜在“轉化端”重建“購買力 → 生活價值”的通道

最致命的問題，從來不是“有沒有購買力”，而是：

購買力是否對應真實的、可持續的生活改善。

GDE 在這一點上提供了一個極其重要的判別工具：

轉化率 R = GDE / GDP。

a.當 R < 1，意味着這個體系正在用更多交易，換取更少的真實價值；

b.當 R > 1，意味着增長正在增強社會的生命承載力。

這一指標，使得“宏觀繁榮、微觀寒冬”不再是感受問題，而成為可被制度識別的結構失衡。

四｜為什麼 GDE 不是烏托邦，也不是“另一種意識形態”

任何試圖重構價值體系的方案，都會遭遇同一個質疑：

這是否只是另一套理想化敘事？

GDE 與以往失敗的嘗試（如單純的幸福指數、綠色 GDP 修正）有一個根本差異：

它不要求人變得更善良，只要求制度不再獎勵破壞性聰明。

GDE 不需要：

a.一個全知全能的政府；

b.一個道德完美的市場；

c.一個放棄競爭的世界。

它只做一件事：改變“什麼行為更划算”。

當透支未來的增長在賬本上被折價，當改善生活的投入在制度上獲得溢價，選擇就會改變，而無需動機被“淨化”。

小結｜真正的轉型，不是抑制增長，而是讓增長重新對生命負責

回顧這三篇的邏輯，其實始終圍繞着一個極其樸素的問題：

增長，究竟是為了讓數字變大，還是為了讓生活變好？

在 GDP 主導的時代，我們用規模掩蓋了代價，用未來抵押了當下；在 GDE 提供的視角中，增長第一次被要求回答一個被長期迴避的問題：

你為誰創造了什麼？代價由誰承擔？是否值得繼續？

當這一問題被制度化、被量化、被持續追問時，“規模—外匯—互害”的迴路，才真正失去了自我延續的正當性。

文明的躍遷，並不發生在口號中，而發生在記賬方式改變的那一刻。

統一結語:當記賬方式改變，文明的方向才會改變

回看這組三篇討論，可以發現一個貫穿始終的判斷：

當一個文明把“發生了多少交易”當作終極真理，它遲早會用規模掩蓋代價，用未來抵押當下，用他人的不穩定換取自己的暫時平衡。

無論是無效 GDP 的反覆累積，還是外匯與購買力被集中使用、難以普惠生活，抑或國際關係中不斷加劇的不信任與投機行為，其深層原因都指向同一件事：

我們長期缺乏一套能夠區分“價值創造”與“價值稀釋”的制度性機制。

在這種情況下，通脹與通縮會被反覆用作技術性工具，債務會被不斷延期與滾動，資產與風險會被持續重估與轉移，而生活成本與不確定性，則被系統性地壓向家庭、社區與未來世代。

共生經濟學提出的 GDE（生態發展總值 / 國民效能總值），並非一種完美方案，也不是現行體系的簡單替代品。它的真正意義，在於把“增長是否值得”這一問題，重新引入制度核心。

當 GDP 從終極目標降維為原始輸入，當效能、福祉與生態成為必須被計入的價值參數，增長才第一次被要求對生命本身負責，而不僅僅對賬面負責。

這種轉變不會一蹴而就，也不可能沒有阻力。但歷史一再證明：真正決定文明走向的，從來不是資源是否充足，而是記賬方式是否誠實。

當一個社會開始認真區分哪些增長值得被延續，哪些繁榮只是推遲的代價，文明的方向，才會真正發生改變。

這，或許正是我們此刻最需要的，不是更快的擴張，而是一次關於“什麼值得被承認”的集體校準。

作者單位：Intersubjective Symbiosism Foundation·CANADA

From GDP to GDE

How to Cut the Institutional Loop of “Scale–Foreign Exchange–Mutual Harm”

Hong Qian (Archer Hong Qian)
January 30, 2026 · Vancouver

Affiliation: Intersubjective Symbiosism Foundation · Canada

Unified Preface

Why Must We Rethink the Meaning of “Growth”?

For more than half a century, human civilization has operated under an implicit consensus:
as long as economic scale keeps expanding, problems will eventually be solved;
as long as GDP keeps rising, improvements in living standards are only a matter of time.

This belief once worked during the expansionary phase of industrial civilization.
It supported postwar reconstruction, the rollout of infrastructure, the formation of global trade networks, and provided a realistic path for billions of people to escape absolute poverty.

However, after entering the second decade of the 21st century, this consensus has begun to fail systematically.

An increasing number of countries and societies are now experiencing the same paradoxical condition simultaneously:
macroeconomic indicators continue to expand, while micro-level lived experience continues to contract;
productive capacity keeps growing, yet life certainty keeps declining;
financial assets and foreign exchange reserves hit record highs, while households and communities increasingly feel tense, fragile, and insecure.

These phenomena are neither isolated incidents nor governance failures of individual countries.
They cut across systems, cultures, and ideologies, exhibiting strikingly similar structural characteristics.

This forces us to confront a question long deliberately avoided:
when “growth” no longer automatically translates into better lives, is the problem merely one of distribution—or does it lie in the very way we define and measure success?

This three-part series is organized around that question.

• The first essay reveals, at the institutional and civilizational level, how “ineffective GDP” forms a self-sustaining closed loop through debt, inflation, and pricing power.

• The second analyzes foreign exchange and purchasing power parity, explaining why macro-scale advantages do not naturally translate into broad-based improvements in living standards, and may instead spill over into mechanisms of international mutual harm.

• The third addresses a more constructive—and more challenging—question: if the problem is not growth itself, but the value parameters by which growth is measured, can those parameters be changed?

This is not a set of anti-growth, anti-market, or anti-globalization essays.
On the contrary, it seeks a way for growth, markets, and global cooperation to continue—without relying on mortgaging the future or externalizing costs.

Introduction

The Question Is No Longer “Whether to Grow,” but “Whether Growth Is Still Worth Recognizing”

In the first two essays, we accomplished two things:

First, we demonstrated that the core dilemma of today’s global economy is not cyclical volatility, but the failure of a value-accounting system centered on scale.

Second, we showed that within this system, even achievements such as “second in GDP, first in PPP, first in foreign exchange reserves” do not naturally translate into broad improvements in living standards, and may instead spill over into international mutual-harm mechanisms.

At this point, the question is no longer whether to grow, but something more fundamental—and more dangerous:

Should we continue to allow all forms of growth, without distinction, to be counted as “success”?

If the answer is yes, then no matter whether we switch to a gold standard, silver standard, stablecoin standard, or even a different hegemonic global currency, the outcome will not change—

Scale will continue to expand, while life continues to be squeezed;
foreign exchange will continue to accumulate, while trust continues to erode.

This is precisely the question the third essay must answer:

How can we make institutions themselves lose the ability to reward ineffective growth—without rejecting markets, relying on moral awakening, or resorting to ideology?

I. The Real Root of the Problem

Not a Monetary Failure, but a Failure of “Value Parameters”

We are accustomed to attributing economic problems to policy mistakes, unfair distribution, external shocks, or even the “motives” of certain countries or groups.

But when we elevate our perspective by one level, a more explanatory—and more unsettling—fact emerges:

When a civilization substitutes “how many transactions occurred” for “how much value was created,” systemic distortion is not accidental—it is inevitable.

GDP’s historical contribution cannot be denied.
During the industrial era, it successfully accomplished a difficult task:

using a unified monetary yardstick to aggregate dispersed production and exchange activities into measurable “scale capacity.”

The problem is that this additive logic is no longer capable, in the 21st century, of identifying three critical realities:

a. Which activities are drawing down future repayment capacity;
b. Which forms of growth erode households, communities, and ecosystems;
c. Which “successes” merely defer costs into the future, shift them from organizations to individuals, or transfer them from centers to peripheries.

As a result, we see a familiar and dangerous pattern:

accounting prosperity persists, while lived experience deteriorates;
scale records are constantly broken, while social trust and international order decline in tandem.

This is not a failure of governance capacity—it is a failure of the value parameters themselves.

II. The Core Meaning of GDE

Not Replacing GDP, but Auditing It

The GDE proposed by Symbionomics—Gross Development of Ecology / Gross Domestic Efficiency—is often misunderstood as an attempt to replace GDP with a new indicator.

This is a serious misunderstanding.

GDE does not seek to negate GDP’s value; it seeks to reposition it.

Under the GDE framework, GDP is explicitly “dimensionality-reduced”:

a. From an ultimate goal to a raw input flow;
b. From “success itself” to a cost item that must be audited.

In other words:

GDP answers the question: What happened?
GDE answers the question: Were these things worth happening?

The key shift is not addition versus subtraction, but multiplicative filtering.

The basic structure of GDE can be summarized as:

GDE = Σ (GDPᵢ × ηᵢ)

Here, η is not a simple energy-efficiency coefficient, but a composite effectiveness parameter that includes at least three dimensions:

a. Impact on resource and energy efficiency;
b. Impact on social welfare and life certainty;
c. Impact on ecosystems and future carrying capacity.

When η < 1, it means that although this portion of GDP “occurred,” it diluted real civilizational value overall.
Only when η > 1 does growth amplify long-term social effectiveness.

The purpose of GDE is not to generate “better-looking numbers,” but to make ineffective growth institutionally unprofitable.

III. How Does GDE Cut the “Scale–Foreign Exchange–Mutual Harm” Loop?

In the second essay, a “civilizational diagnostic chart” clearly demonstrated one fact:

foreign exchange fails to benefit the public not because of a lack of redistribution, but because every step—from entry, to placement, to conversion—bypasses households and daily life.

So what does GDE actually change?

1. Cutting Off the Automatic Pass for Ineffective Growth at the Entry Point

Under the GDP system, once a monetary transaction occurs, it almost automatically gains entry into the “success narrative.”

Low-efficiency infrastructure, redundant investment, and scale expansion at the expense of households and ecosystems can all be counted equivalently.

GDE’s first change is this:

scale alone no longer grants access to the success ledger.

When the effectiveness coefficient η becomes a necessary condition:

a. Growth that relies on mortgaging the future or compressing living space is systematically discounted;
b. Activities that genuinely improve life and reduce social costs receive higher value weightings.

This is not administrative veto—it is value auditing.

2. Changing the Allocation Logic of Capital and Foreign Exchange at the Placement Stage

Capital and foreign exchange have long flowed outward and upward not because decision-makers ignore livelihoods, but because under the existing system:

returns from improving daily life are poorly recognized in macro accounts.

GDE changes precisely this recognition mechanism.

When public service accessibility, reductions in living costs, and ecological restoration are explicitly incorporated into effectiveness parameters, optimal capital allocation shifts:

a. Investment in households and communities becomes an effectiveness amplifier rather than a cost center;
b. Investment in ecological restoration becomes a long-term value asset rather than a moral expense.

Under such a structure, foreign exchange does not need to be forcibly retained domestically—it naturally settles where effectiveness is higher.

3. Rebuilding the Conversion Channel from Purchasing Power to Life Value

The most lethal problem has never been whether purchasing power exists, but whether it corresponds to real, sustainable improvements in life.

Here, GDE provides a crucial diagnostic tool:

Conversion ratio R = GDE / GDP

a. When R < 1, the system is using more transactions to obtain less real value;
b. When R > 1, growth is enhancing society’s life-carrying capacity.

This indicator transforms “macro prosperity, micro winter” from a feeling into a structurally identifiable imbalance.

IV. Why GDE Is Neither a Utopia nor “Another Ideology”

Any attempt to reconstruct a value system faces the same challenge:

Is this merely another idealized narrative?

GDE differs fundamentally from past failed attempts (such as happiness indices or green GDP adjustments) in one key respect:

it does not require people to become more virtuous—it only requires institutions to stop rewarding destructive cleverness.

GDE does not require:

a. An omniscient government;
b. A morally perfect market;
c. A world that abandons competition.

It does one thing only: it changes what behaviors are profitable.

When growth that mortgages the future is discounted in accounts, and investments that improve life receive institutional premiums, choices change—without the need to purify motives.

Summary

True Transformation Is Not Suppressing Growth, but Requiring Growth to Answer to Life

Across all three essays, the logic revolves around a simple question:

Is growth meant to make numbers bigger, or lives better?

In the GDP-dominated era, scale concealed costs and the future was mortgaged for the present.
Under the GDE perspective, growth is finally required to answer a long-avoided question:

For whom did you create what?
Who bears the cost?
Is it worth continuing?

Only when this question is institutionalized, quantified, and continuously asked does the “scale–foreign exchange–mutual harm” loop lose its legitimacy for self-perpetuation.

Civilizational shifts do not occur in slogans—they occur at the moment accounting rules change.

Unified Conclusion

When Accounting Changes, the Direction of Civilization Changes

Looking back at the three essays, a consistent judgment emerges:

When a civilization treats “how many transactions occurred” as ultimate truth, it will inevitably use scale to conceal costs, mortgage the future for the present, and trade others’ instability for temporary balance.

Whether through repeated accumulation of ineffective GDP, concentration of foreign exchange and purchasing power, or escalating distrust and speculation in international relations, the root cause is the same:

we have long lacked an institutional mechanism capable of distinguishing value creation from value dilution.

Under such conditions, inflation and deflation become technical tools, debt is endlessly rolled over, assets and risks are continuously revalued and transferred, and living costs and uncertainty are systematically pushed onto households, communities, and future generations.

The GDE proposed by Symbionomics is neither a perfect solution nor a simple substitute for the existing system.
Its true significance lies in reintroducing the question “Is growth worth it?” into the institutional core.

When GDP is reduced from ultimate goal to raw input, and effectiveness, welfare, and ecology become mandatory value parameters, growth is finally required to answer to life itself—not merely to accounting statements.

This transformation will not be instantaneous, nor will it be frictionless.
But history repeatedly shows: what determines the direction of civilization is never whether resources are sufficient, but whether accounting is honest.

When a society begins to seriously distinguish which forms of growth deserve continuation and which forms of prosperity are merely deferred costs, the direction of civilization truly begins to change.

Perhaps what we need most at this moment is not faster expansion, but a collective recalibration of what is worthy of recognition.