Click to expand Image A family collects water lilies from Boeung Tamok lake to sell at the market, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, January 14, 2025. © 2025 Heng Sinith/AP Photo There is growing recognition that current economic metrics fail to capture much of what really matters. Gross domestic product (GDP), which measures total economic activity and is a cornerstone of economic decision-making, is blind to issues such as whether children have quality public schools, people have access to health care, or government institutions are accountable to the public they serve. When economic decision-making is narrowly focused on GDP growth, it leaves human rights behind.But two recent United Nations reports suggest a paradigm shift could be coming. The milestone reports offer concrete recommendations for moving beyond an overemphasis on GDP that could make a major difference for human rights.A report released this month by a UN Secretary General-appointed expert group proposes alternative indicators for measuring economic progress. The dashboard of 31 indicators includes many directly related to human rights, in line with what Human Rights Watch has long advocated, such as key health and education outcomes and the prevalence of discrimination and intimate partner violence. It also includes measures of poverty, inequality, labor rights, environmental sustainability, and public trust.While it is up to governments and international institutions now to adopt and integrate these indicators, they offer a chance to meaningfully shift economic incentives. The report also recommends development of a headline indicator that aggregates multiple dimensions. GDP weighs heavily on everything from credit ratings to borrowing costs, even though it is an unreliable predictor of economic vulnerability and resilience. An indicator that gives weight to human rights, inequality, and environmental sustainability could improve the quality of economic data while incentivizing governments to make decisions that lead to more equitable economies.Another report, a “roadmap” for moving beyond an approach that depends on growth in order to improve respect for economic, social, and cultural rights, was launched on April 21 and comes from the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Olivier de Schutter. It lists evidence-based policies that the paper argues could better fulfill rights, including adequate funding for public services and universal social security and upholding labor rights, as well the adoption of indicators beyond GDP.These reports do more than build momentum. They show the UN can meet the moment and use its position to try and shift something as globally entrenched as GDP fixation. It is now up to governments to follow suit.