R i g h t a r d i a: UN Human Devopment Index: The best place in the world to live is Norway

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

UN Human Devopment Index: The best place in the world to live is Norway

Borat thinks America is the greatest country in the world

For years we have heard the Republicans tell us that the US is the greatest country in the world.

Conservatives would like Americans to think we are the best because they wish to maintain the status quo rather than improve our country that needs huge changes to its crumbling infrastructure.

Conservatives are also saying we have the best health system in the world which is a lie. We aren't even close. We are 37th in the world according to the World Health Organization.

Our education system in the US also needs serious revamping. Republicans need to take off their rose colored glasses and work with Democrats to make America a better county. That may be a tall order for the 'Party of No." America needs more realistic and pragmatic. We could be the greatest country in the world if we put our mind to it like the Chinese are doing.

An annual Human Development Report (HDR) report by the United Nations has found that Norway has the highest standard of living for its citizens.

You can access statistical data from the Human Development Report (HDR) and resources to help you better understand this data. You will also find helpful information about the human development index (HDI) and other indices, links to other background materials, data resources and on-going debates and discussions on human development statistics.

The HDI combines three dimensions:

Life expectancy at birth, as an index of population health and longevity
Knowledge and education, as measured by the adult literacy rate (with two-thirds weighting) and the combined primary, secondary, and tertiary gross enrollment ratio (with one-third weighting).
Standard of living, as measured by the natural logarithm of gross domestic product per capita at purchasing power parity.

The country that came last was Niger. As the UN noted:

Norway's consistently high rating for desirable living standards, is, in large part, the result of the discovery of offshore oil and gas deposits in the late 1960s.

Niger, however, is a drought-prone country which has sometimes struggled to feed its people.

Due to improvements in education, income levels and life expectancy, China moved up seven places on the list to rank as the 92nd most developed country. The Irish Times noted this was one of the few long term trends noticeable in the data.

Afghanistan was a new entry, having previously not been included due to a lack of reliable data, according to the AP. It entered the rankings second to last, just above Niger.

The top ten was as follows: