Do strip clubs help economic growth?

[angus]

Do strip clubs help economic growth?

No.  Economic growth is roughly the ratio of this year's GDP to last year's GDP.  A strip club employs people with would otherwise either be employed elsewhere or unemployed.  It also collects money which would either be spent elsewhere or saved.  The strip club, like Wal-Mart, libraries, porn shops, and television stations, does not create capital, and therefore it does not contribute to GDP.  It merely reshuffles extant capital.

[angus]

perhaps they do.  perhaps they don't.  I'm not arguing that fine point.  and I have nothing against strip clubs, but they do not contribute to economic growth.  when you read in the WSJ about the "growth" of the economy as a small number, like 3 percent or something, it's talking about how much Product there is compared to last year.  Sure, lots of estmates, fudge factors, and aggregates go into this quantity, but in the end, whether I buy a Pepsi or a Blow Job is irrelevant.  If I earn five dollars, and you earn five dollars, and you spend one dollar on a stripper whose income is one dollar and I save five dollars, our Product is ten dollars.  Period.  Strip clubs do not contribute to economic growth.  Mines contribute to economic growth.  As does population increase (in fact natural population increase, including that due to the excess of immigration over emigration, is probably its largest contributor in this country), and various technological advances do as well.  But rechannelling money from other industries and into your favorite industry only affects the distribution of wealth, but not overall growth of the economy.