An island of magic and mayhem floating above the flooded Earth, Bastion has long been the last country left in the world. Then one day best friends Kurt (an eight-foot mushroom with a fear of heights) and Flicker (a tiny, tough-talking gemstone faerie) stand on the edge of the land and see the impossible: a plane from nowhere is heading straight for them. Kurt and Flicker join forces with a brave gang of misfits -- including wood-nymph twins (one bounty hunter, one bookworm) and a gruff, shapeshifting wolf -- to rescue the pilot and face a dangerous enemy. Can the Cloudlanders save their floating island from crashing into the Endless Sea and the terrifying tentacles of a massive monster? Cloudlanders is a fast-paced, laugh-out-loud fantasy adventure with a unique cast of characters, tonnes of heart, and gasp-inducing moments. Fans of Ben Miller, Tom Fletcher and Terry Pratchett will love this quirky and sharply written debut novel from Kelpies Prize winner, Christopher Mackie.

An accurate measure of poverty is necessary to fully understand how the economy is performing across all segments of the population and to assess the effects of government policies on communities and families. In addition, poverty statistics are essential in determining the size and composition of the population whose basic needs are going unmet and to help society target resources to address those needs. An Updated Measure of Poverty: (Re)Drawing the Line recommends updating the methodology used by the Census Bureau to calculate the Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM) to reflect household basic needs. This report recommends that the more comprehensive SPM replace the current Official Poverty Measure as the primary statistical measure of poverty the Census Bureau uses. The report assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the SPM and provides recommendations for updating its methodology and expanding its use in recognition of the needs of most American families such as medical care, childcare, and housing costs. Table of Contents Front Matter Summary 1 Introduction 2 Conceptual Basis of the Supplemental Poverty Measure Appendix 2A: Algebraic Representations of the Supplemental Poverty Measure and the Principal Poverty Measure 3 Treatment of Medical Care in the Proposed Principal Poverty Measure Appendix 3A: Alternative Approaches to Accounting for Medical Care in a Poverty Measure Appendix 3B: Examples of PPM versus SPM treatment of health insurance and medical care 4 Challenging Categories: Childcare 5 Challenging Categories: Housing/Shelter 6 Data and Statistical Issues Appendix 6A: SPM/PPM Threshold Components - Availability in the CE Interview Survey/Taken from Other Sources APPENDIX 6B: SPM/PPM RESOURCE COMPONENTS - Availability in the CPS-ASEC and ACS References Appendix A: Background and Specification of the OPM and the SPM Appendix B: Summary of Public Comments Appendix C: Biographical Sketches of Panel Members

Subjective well-being refers to how people experience and evaluate their lives and specific domains and activities in their lives. This information has already proven valuable to researchers, who have produced insights about the emotional states and experiences of people belonging to different groups, engaged in different activities, at different points in the life course, and involved in different family and community structures. Research has also revealed relationships between people's self-reported, subjectively assessed states and their behavior and decisions. Research on subjective well-being has been ongoing for decades, providing new information about the human condition. During the past decade, interest in the topic among policy makers, national statistical offices, academic researchers, the media, and the public has increased markedly because of its potential for shedding light on the economic, social, and health conditions of populations and for informing policy decisions across these domains. Subjective Well-Being: Measuring Happiness, Suffering, and Other Dimensions of Experience explores the use of this measure in population surveys. This report reviews the current state of research and evaluates methods for the measurement. In this report, a range of potential experienced well-being data applications are cited, from cost-benefit studies of health care delivery to commuting and transportation planning, environmental valuation, and outdoor recreation resource monitoring, and even to assessment of end-of-life treatment options. Subjective Well-Being finds that, whether used to assess the consequence of people's situations and policies that might affect them or to explore determinants of outcomes, contextual and covariate data are needed alongside the subjective well-being measures. This report offers guidance about adopting subjective well-being measures in official government surveys to inform social and economic policies and considers whether research has advanced to a point which warrants the federal government collecting data that allow aspects of the population's subjective well-being to be tracked and associated with changing conditions.

America's farms and farmers are integral to the U.S. economy and, more broadly, to the nation's social and cultural fabric. A healthy agricultural sector helps ensure a safe and reliable food supply, improves energy security, and contributes to employment and economic development, traditionally in small towns and rural areas where farming serves as a nexus for related sectors from farm machinery manufacturing to food processing. The agricultural sector also plays a role in the nation's overall economic growth by providing crucial raw inputs for the production of a wide range of goods and services, including many that generate substantial export value. If the agricultural sector is to be accurately understood and the policies that affect its functioning are to remain well informed, the statistical system's data collection programs must be periodically revisited to ensure they are keeping up with current realities. This report reviews current information and makes recommendations to the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA's) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) and Economic Research Service (ERS) to help identify effective methods for collecting data and reporting information about American agriculture, given increased complexity and other changes in farm business structure in recent decades. Table of Contents Front Matter Summary 1 Introduction 2 Background: USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service and Economic Research Service 3 Dimensions of Farm Complexity 4 Conceptual Issues: Defining Farming, Farms, Farmers, and Agriculture 5 The Growing Complexity of Farm Business Structure: Implications for Data Collection 6 A Broader Data Infrastructure: Administrative and Other Nonsurvey Data Sources Bibliography Appendix: Biographical Sketches of Panel Members Committee on National Statistics

Because of the role of innovation as a driver of economic productivity and growth and as a mechanism for improving people's well-being in other ways, understanding the nature,determinants, and impacts of innovation has become increasingly important to policy makers. To be effective, investment in innovation requires this understanding, which, in turn, requires measurement of the underlying inputs and subsequent outcomes of innovation processes. In May 2016, at the request of the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics of the National Science Foundation, the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a workshop - bringing together academic researchers, private and public sector experts, and representatives from public policy agencies - to develop strategies for broadening and modernizing innovation information systems.This publication summarizes the presentation and discussion of the event. Table of Contents Front Matter 1 Introduction 2 Assessing Innovation Measurement 3 Innovation Beyond R&D and Conventional Input Measures 4 The Role of Individuals (and Networks of Individuals) in Innovation 5 Measuring Public-Sector Innovation and Social Progress 6 Regional Innovation Models and Data Needs 7 Innovation Measurement Agendas of the Future 8 Key Themes and Possible Next Steps References Appendix A: Workshop Agenda Appendix B: Workshop Participants Committee on National Statistics

Higher education is a linchpin of the American economy and society: teaching and research at colleges and universities contribute significantly to the nation's economic activity, both directly and through their impact on future growth; federal and state governments support teaching and research with billions of taxpayers' dollars; and individuals, communities, and the nation gain from the learning and innovation that occur in higher education. In the current environment of increasing tuition and shrinking public funds, a sense of urgency has emerged to better track the performance of colleges and universities in the hope that their costs can be contained without compromising quality or accessibility. Improving Measurement of Productivity in Higher Education presents an analytically well-defined concept of productivity in higher education and recommends empirically valid and operationally practical guidelines for measuring it. In addition to its obvious policy and research value, improved measures of productivity may generate insights that potentially lead to enhanced departmental, institutional, or system educational processes. Improving Measurement of Productivity in Higher Education constructs valid productivity measures to supplement the body of information used to guide resource allocation decisions at the system, state, and national levels and to assist policymakers who must assess investments in higher education against other compelling demands on scarce resources. By portraying the productive process in detail, this report will allow stakeholders to better understand the complexities of-and potential approaches to-measuring institution, system and national-level performance in higher education. Table of Contents Front Matter Summary 1 The Importance of Measuring Productivity in Higher Education 2 Defining Productivity for Higher Education 3 Why Measurement of Higher Education Productivity Is Difficult 4 Advancing the Conceptual Framework 5 Recommendations for Creating and Extending the Measurement Framework 6 Implementation and Data Recommendations References and Bibliography Appendix A: Commonly Used Performance Metrics for Higher Education Appendix B: Methods for Measuring Comparative Quality and Cost Developed by the National Center for Academic Transformation Appendix C: Overview of Data Sources Appendix D: Estimating Project-Related Departmental Research Appendix E: Biographical Sketches of Panel Members Committee on National Statistics Board on Testing and Assessment

Intangible assets-which include computer software, research and development (R&D), intellectual property, workforce training, and spending to raise the efficiency and brand identification of firms-comprise a subset of services, which, in turn, accounts for three-quarters of all economic activity. Increasingly, intangibles are a principal driver of the competitiveness of U.S.-based firms, economic growth, and opportunities for U.S. workers. Yet, despite these developments, many intangible assets are not reported by companies, and, in the national economic accounts, they are treated as expenses rather than investments. On June 23, 2008, a workshop was held to examine measurement of intangibles and their role in the U.S. and global economies. The workshop, summarized in the present volume, included discussions of a range of policy-relevant topics, including: what intangibles are and how they work; the variety and scale of emerging markets in intangibles; and what the government's role should be in supporting markets and promoting investment in intangibles. Table of Contents Front Matter 1 Overview 2 Intangible Assets in a Knowledge Economy 3 Macroeconomic Implications of Intangible Assets 4 Intangibles in the Firm and in Financial Markets 5 Intangibles and Government Measurement 6 Intangibles and Government Policy References Appendix: Workshop Agenda Committee on National Statistics Science, Technology, and Economic Policy Board

The national income and product accounts that underlie gross domestic product (GDP), together with other key economic data?price and employment statistics? are widely used as indicators of how well the nation is doing. GDP, however, is focused on the production of goods and services sold in markets and reveals relatively little about important production in the home and other areas outside of markets. A set of satellite accounts?in areas such as health, education, volunteer and home production, and environmental improvement or pollution?would contribute to a better understanding of major issues related to economic growth and societal well-being. Beyond the Market: Designing Nonmarket Accounts for the United States hopes to encourage social scientists to make further efforts and contributions in the analysis of nonmarket activities and in corresponding data collection and accounting systems. The book illustrates new data sources and new ideas that have improved the prospects for progress. Table of Contents Front Matter Executive Summary 1 Introduction 2 Accounting and Data Foundations 3 Home Production 4 The Role of the Family in the Production of Human Capital 5 Education 6 Health 7 The Government and Private Nonprofit Sectors 8 The Environment References Appendix: Biographical Sketches of Panel Members and Staff Index

In March 2008, the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies held a workshop to assist the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) with next steps as it develops plans to produce a satellite health care account. This account, designed to improve its measurement of economic activity in the medical care sector, will benefit health care policy. The purpose of the workshop, summarized in this volume, was to elicit expert guidance on strategies to implement the objectives of the BEA program. The ultimate objectives of the program are to:
compile medical care spending information by type of disease-a system more directly useful for measuring health care inputs, outputs, and productivity than current estimates of spending by type of provider; produce a comprehensive set of accounts for health care-sector income, expenditure, and product; develop medical care price and real output measures that will help analysts to break out changes in the delivery of health care from changes in the prices of that care; and coordinate BEA and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) health expenditure statistics.

How well does the consumer price index (CPI) reflect the changes that people actually face in living costs?from apples to computers to health care? Given how it is used, is it desirable to construct the CPI as a cost-of-living index (COLI)? With what level of accuracy is it possible to construct a single index that represents changes in the living costs of the nation's diverse population? At What Price? examines the foundations for consumer price indexes, comparing the conceptual and practical strengths, weaknesses, and limitations of traditional "fixed basket" and COLI approaches. The book delves into a range of complex issues, from how to deal with the changing quality of goods and services, including difficult-to-define medical services, to how to weight the expenditure patterns of different consumers. It sorts through the key attributes and underlying assumptions that define each index type in order to answer the question: Should a COLI framework be used in constructing the U.S. CPI? In answering this question, the book makes recommendations as to how the Bureau of Labor Statistics can continue to improve the accuracy and relevance of the CPI. With conclusions that could affect the amount of your next pay raise, At What Price? is important to everyone, and a must-read for policy makers, researchers, and employers. Table of Contents Front Matter Executive Summary 1 Introduction 2 Conceptual Foundations for Price and Cost-of-Living Indexes 3 Index Domain 4 Evolving Market Baskets: Adjusting Indexes to Account for Quality Change 5 New Goods and New Outlets 6 The Special Case of Medical Services 7 Index Design and Index Purpose 8 Whose Index? Aggregating Across Households 9 Data Collection for CPI Construction Appendix: Statistical Definition and Estimation of Price Indexes References Glossary Biographical Sketches of Panel Members and Staff Index