Experience with Different Methodologies for National Income Accounting in Central and Eastern European Countries, 1950-1990
Experience with Different Methodologies for National Income Accounting in Central and Eastern European Countries, 1950-1990

Summary/Abstract: During the period of centrally planning in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries the officially applied accounting system was the so-called Material Product System (MPS), which has been different from the System of National Accounts (SNA). This hampered the international comparisons of national income (Net Material Product - NMP), which was the basic macro-indicators of the centrally planned economies (CPEs) and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the market type economies. In parallel with the official practice in CPEs individual authors (like T. P. Alton and associates, A. Maddison, and others) or/and international organisations derived estimates of these countries’ national income mainly trying to transform NMP into GDP (GNP). The International Comparison Project (ICP), where countries from CEE participated, was of great importance for producing comparable estimates. In this study the known different approaches are presented, their methodological specificity is analysed and estimates of national income and economic growth for the period 1950-1990 are compared.

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