It is an odd confession to make about a statistic, I realize, but then again I am an economist, so I am just going to go ahead: I love GDP. There. I said it. GDP — for gross domestic product, the total market value of all final goods and services produced within a county’s borders — is in many ways the ideal economic statistic, both for what it measures and what it represents. It is a single number that captures so much information, with a scope and history unmatched by almost any other measure. I am unapologetic in my desire to see it grow.