IESET.
Hypotheses·growth·ubs_material_throughput_efficiency

Universal Basic Services provision (UK post-war, Nordic) delivers equivalent wellbeing outcomes to consumption-based equivalents at lower material-throughput levels.

INCONCLUSIVEengine/runs/ubs_material_throughput_efficiency

INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'ubs_indicator' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

confidence cueResult card produced; verdict unclassified.

policy briefCoverage too thin

In ordinary language

Over a long period, do more market-oriented institutions translate into higher income or productivity, once the comparison looks beyond a single success story?

plain answer

This test cannot make a firm call yet. treatment 'ubs_indicator' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

why it matters

Growth claims can look convincing in single success stories. This test asks whether the pattern survives a broader comparison.

how the test works

It compares 17 country or place units from 1970 to 2022, using a panel fe design, with fixed effects for country and year.

what was measured
What changed
  • Ubs indicator
  • Social expenditure pct income
What we checked
  • Life expectancy at birth
  • Life satisfaction
  • Hdi
what this does not prove

A single test is not the whole truth. It narrows the claim under a specific sample, time period, and method. Strong policy conclusions need the pattern to survive nearby tests, alternative data, and serious objections.

verification

No evidence packet has been generated yet.

Results

engine/runs/ubs_material_throughput_efficiency
1007550250197019962022GBRSWENORDNKFINUSADEU
illustrative sketch · run pending
No coefficients yet. When the model fires, this chart will show life_expectancy_at_birth across 17 sampled countries over 1970–2022.
The shapes above are stylised — none of the lines are real data.
Placeholder for ubs_material_throughput_efficiency. Published chart will be generated from engine/runs/ubs_material_throughput_efficiency/chart_data.json.

Who has skin in the game — schools predicting on this

10 schools list this hypothesis as a test of their position. The chips below are school-level scoreboard outcomes, not a second hypothesis verdict.

hypothesis verdict vs scoreboard outcome

The banner verdict judges this hypothesis as written. The scoreboard asks whether each school's polarity-corrected prediction was right. Raw status is not a school win: SUPPORTED supports schools that needed SUPPORTED, but refutes schools that needed REFUTED.

Degrowth / Ecological Macroeconomicswins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callDemocratic Socialism (Bernsteinian revisionism + modern)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callEco-Socialism / Red-Greenwins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callMarket Socialism (Lange-Lerner tradition)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callMarxian Political Economywins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callMarxism-Leninism (central-planning implementation)wins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callModern Monetary Theorywins if MIXEDpartial/no-callNew Keynesian (mainstream synthesis)wins if MIXEDpartial/no-callPost-Keynesianwins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-callSocial Democraticwins if SUPPORTEDpartial/no-call

Pre-registration

pre-registered
first-spec commit bae09ab · 2026-04-29T22:09:42Z
run generated · 2026-06-29T17:53:06Z

Universal Basic Services provision (UK post-war, Nordic) delivers equivalent wellbeing outcomes to consumption-based equivalents at lower material-throughput levels.

Falsification criterion — what would disprove this

set before the run · honoured after

This hypothesis is considered falsified if:

The hypothesis is considered falsified if the pre-registered empirical test shows the opposite direction of the claim at conventional significance (p > 0.10), or if the primary outcome measure moves less than 10% in the claimed direction across the sample. Exact thresholds will be pinned in the variables and estimator blocks when this stub is promoted from draft.

formal test & threshold
test:      Panel FE of life expectancy and life satisfaction on UBS indicator and material-footprint per capita, country and year FE 1970-2022; falsified if UBS coefficient on wellbeing not positive at p<0.10 conditional on lower throughput.

Method

Template
panel_fe
Fixed effects
country, year
Clustering
country
Sample
17 countries · 1970 – 2022
Evidence type
associational

Cross-country panel of UBS-providing economies (UK postwar, Nordic) vs consumption-equivalent matched comparators 1945-2023. Outcomes: life expectancy, life satisfaction, and material-footprint-per-capita. Tests whether UBS provision delivers equivalent wellbeing at lower material throughput.

Data

VariableSourceTransform
life_expectancy_at_birth
outcome
world_bank_wdi:SP.DYN.LE00.INtier 2
level
life_satisfaction
outcome
owid:happiness-cantril-laddertier 2
level
hdi
outcome
undp_hdi:hditier 2
level
log_co2_emissions_per_capita
outcome
owid:co-emissions-per-capitatier 2
log
ubs_indicator
treatment
constructed:indicator = 1 for GBR (post-1948), SWE, NOR, DNK, FIN (Nordic universalist welfare); 0 for USA-style consumption-equivaltier 5
indicator
social_expenditure_pct_gdp
treatment
oecd:SOCX_AGGtier 2
level
log_gdp_pc_ppp
control
world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KDtier 2
log
log_population
control
world_bank_wdi:SP.POP.TOTLtier 2
log

● ready  · ● pending  · ● reconstruct-needed

Detailed result card

Result card — ubs_material_throughput_efficiency

Verdict: INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'ubs_indicator' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

Pre-registration

  • Claim: Universal Basic Services provision (UK post-war, Nordic) delivers equivalent wellbeing outcomes to consumption-based equivalents at lower material-throughput levels.
  • Falsification rule: The hypothesis is considered falsified if the pre-registered empirical test shows the opposite direction of the claim at conventional significance (p > 0.10), or if the primary outcome measure moves less than 10% in the claimed direction across the sample. Exact thresholds will be pinned in the variables and estimator blocks when this stub is promoted from draft.
  • Falsification test: Panel FE of life expectancy and life satisfaction on UBS indicator and material-footprint per capita, country and year FE 1970-2022; falsified if UBS coefficient on wellbeing not positive at p<0.10 conditional on lower throughput.

Estimate

  • Error: treatment 'ubs_indicator' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects

Variables resolved

  • world_bank_wdi:SP.DYN.LE00.IN → life_expectancy_at_birth (outcome, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=14443)
  • owid:happiness-cantril-ladder → life_satisfaction (outcome, publisher=owid, n=2270)
  • undp_hdi:hdi → hdi (outcome, publisher=undp_hdi, n=6314)
  • constructed: indicator = 1 for GBR (post-1948), SWE, NOR, DNK, FIN (Nordic universalist welfare); 0 for USA-style consumption-equivalent peers → ubs_indicator (treatment, publisher=constructed, n=901)
  • oecd:SOCX_AGG → social_expenditure_pct_gdp (treatment, publisher=oecd, n=1649)
  • world_bank_wdi:NY.GDP.PCAP.PP.KD → log_gdp_pc_ppp (controls, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=8325)
  • world_bank_wdi:SP.POP.TOTL → log_population (controls, publisher=world_bank_wdi, n=14447)

Variables missing data

  • owid:co-emissions-per-capita (outcome, name=log_co2_emissions_per_capita) — vintage not on disk

Generated by scripts/run_panel_fe.py at 2026-06-29T17:53:06+00:00

Notes

Seeded from a degrowth claim that Universal Basic Services (UK postwar, Nordic) deliver equivalent wellbeing to consumption-equivalents at lower material throughput. Cross-country panel with treatment indicator; human review needed for matched comparator selection.

Authored framework. Read the transparency note.