Nicolas Sarkozy, the French President, wants to redefine economic growth which is just as well because France is struggling on the traditional measure. Speaking yesterday in Paris, the President announced that a panel led by Joseph Stiglitz, the American critic of globalisation and including another Nobel Laureate, the Indian economist Amartya Sen, would seek to develop new indicators for economic growth. These would include a measure of quality of life alongside traditional numerical indicators of production and output.

A new indicator, incorporating a notion of lifestyle and national wellbeing might help the President to head off mounting discontent among the French electorate where there are increasing signs of irritation that Mr Sarkozy's personal wellbeing - the President yesterday acknowledged his plans to marry Carla Bruni, the Italian model - was taking precedence over efforts to bring about change in France. Mr Stiglitz, who is known for his critique of the World Bank's approach to economic development, confirmed yesterday that he would chair the panel. He said that standard measures of GDP don't include the effect of environmental degradation on public wellbeing. "If you improve the quality of life, it doesn't show in material consumption, it doesn't show up in GDP," said Mr Stiglitz.

The French government's budget assumes growth of between 2 per cent and 2.5 per cent, but INSEE, the French statistical agency, reckons the country will undershoot that target with a more likely outcome of 1.9 per cent. Still, there is good reason to criticise GDP as a measure of national prosperity. It is a crude measure of output that fails to take account of important questions relating to income distribution, inequality and access to health and education. The availability of good quality medical care adds as much to the national feel-good factor as the figure that registers in the nation's till, a disconnect that is well understood in Britain. It also explains why a country, such as France, that faces such huge obstacles relating to growth, employment and national debt still feels great loyalty to a system that has not delivered the goods in terms of jobs and new businesses. If hundreds of thousands of Britons choose to live in France, it is not because of its dynamic economy, it is because they enjoy the life-style.

That may explain why his agenda, as set out yesterday, was full of stuff intended to make French people feel good about being French - an initiative to make Paris the world's most beautiful city, a project to raise the status of public service television with a ban on advertising and he said the government would use the Caisse de Depots, a state fund, to protect French companies from takeover by foreign sovereign wealth funds. Still, Mr Sarkozy had mixed messages yesterday for the French electorate. He has not abandoned plans to end the 35-hour week - employment law reforms are a major plank in his effort to put the French economy back on track. You may feel good, says the French president, but only if you work a lot harder.

Explore Economics

• Pre-Budget Report 2009

• Budget 2009

• World Economic Forum in Davos

• The Times MPC

Times Recommends

• Toyota recalls 437,000 cars including Lexus
• Myners says bonuses are bleeding pension funds
• Japanese company faked safety reports on seats