Argentina’s Fudged Data Threaten Middle Class

Jan. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Economists dub the challenge ofcreating analysis with faulty data “GIGO,” or “garbage in,garbage out.” Fudged statistics may seem relatively innocuouswithin the context of problems confronting the global economy.However, faulty data can thrust millions into poverty andprevent others from reaching the middle class.

John Maynard Keynes argued vehemently that theInternational Monetary Fund should play a central role inensuring quality statistics for the management of the worldeconomy. “There is hardly any greater service the Fund can dothan provide up-to-date barometers of the monetary problems ofthe world,” Keynes said at the Bretton Woods Conference in1944.