HDI
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a summary composite index that measures a country's average achievements in three basic aspects of human development: health, knowledge, and income. It was first developed by the late Pakistani economist Mahbub ul Haq with the collaboration of the Nobel laureate Amartya Sen and other leading development thinkers for the first Human Development Report in 1990. The breakthrough for the HDI was the creation of a single statistic which was to serve as a frame of reference for both social and economic development. It was introduced as an alternative to conventional measures of national development, such as level of income and the rate of economic growth.
HDI combine indicators of health, knowledge and income. Health is measured by life expectancy at birth. Measures achievement in knowledge by combining the expected years of schooling for a school-age child in a country today with the mean years of prior schooling for adults aged 25 and older. The income measurement consists of purchasing-power-adjusted per capita Gross National Income (GNI).
Source: hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/hdi/
List of countries with the highest HDI and its components in 2010 are listed below.
| RANK | COUNTRY | HDI value | Life expectancy at birth | Mean years of schooling | Expected years of schooling | Gross national income (GNI) per capita |
| 1 | Norway | 0.938 | 81.0 | 12.6 | 17.3 | 58,810 |
| 2 | Australia | 0.937 | 81.9 | 12.0 | 20.5 | 38,692 |
| 3 | New Zealand | 0.907 | 80.6 | 12.5 | 19.7 | 25,438 |
| 4 | United States | 0.902 | 79.6 | 12.4 | 15.7 | 47,094 |
| 5 | Ireland | 0.895 | 80.3 | 11.6 | 17.9 | 33,078 |
| 6 | Liechtenstein | 0.891 | 79.6 | 10.3 | 14.8 | 81,011 |
| 7 | Netherlands | 0.890 | 80.3 | 11.2 | 16.7 | 40,658 |
| 8 | Canada | 0.888 | 81.0 | 11.5 | 16.0 | 38,668 |
| 9 | Sweden | 0.885 | 81.3 | 11.6 | 15.6 | 36,936 |
| 10 | Germany | 0.885 | 80.2 | 12.2 | 15.6 | 35,308 |
| 11 | Japan | 0.884 | 83.2 | 11.5 | 15.1 | 34,692 |
| 12 | Korea | 0.877 | 79.8 | 11.6 | 16.8 | 29,518 |
| 13 | Switzerland | 0.874 | 82.2 | 10.3 | 15.5 | 39,849 |
| 14 | France | 0.872 | 81.6 | 10.4 | 16.1 | 34,341 |
| 15 | Israel | 0.872 | 81.2 | 11.9 | 15.6 | 27,831 |
| 16 | Finland | 0.871 | 80.1 | 10.3 | 17.1 | 33,872 |
| 17 | Iceland | 0.869 | 82.1 | 10.4 | 18.2 | 22,917 |
| 18 | Belgium | 0.867 | 80.3 | 10.6 | 15.9 | 34,873 |
| 19 | Denmark | 0.866 | 78.7 | 10.3 | 16.9 | 36,404 |
| 20 | Spain | 0.863 | 81.3 | 10.4 | 16.4 | 29,661 |
Source: http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR_2010_EN_Table1_reprint.pdf ,
While in the early 90's Japan was a on top of the list, at the end of the 90’s ranking was dominated by Canada. In the XXI century first place was almost constantly occupied by Norway (with a short break for Iceland).
In the following list you can compare countries with the highest GDP and their outcome in HDI ranking.
| COUNTRY | GDP Rank | HDI Rank | HDI value | Average annual HDI growth rate (%) |
| 2010 | 2010 | 2010 | 2000 - 2010 | |
| United States | 1 | 4 | 0.902 | 0.10 |
| China | 2 | 89 | 0.663 | 1.57 |
| Japan | 3 | 11 | 0.884 | 0.33 |
| Germany | 4 | 10 | 0.885 | .. |
| France | 5 | 14 | 0.872 | 0.45 |
| United Kingdom | 6 | 26 | 0.849 | 0.31 |
| Brazil | 7 | 73 | 0.699 | 0.73 |
| Italy | 8 | 23 | 0.854 | 0.35 |
| Canada | 9 | 8 | 0.888 | 0.24 |
| India | 10 | 119 | 0.519 | 1.66 |
| Russia | 11 | 65 | 0.719 | 0.70 |
| Spain | 12 | 20 | 0.863 | 0.42 |
| Australia | 13 | 2 | 0.937 | 0.25 |
| Mexico | 14 | 56 | 0.750 | 0.73 |
| South Korea | 15 | 12 | 0.877 | 0.74 |
| Netherlands | 16 | 7 | 0.890 | 0.25 |
| Turkey | 17 | 83 | 0.679 | 0.76 |
| Indonesia | 18 | 108 | 0.600 | 1.82 |
| Switzerland | 19 | 13 | 0.874 | 0.18 |
| Poland | 20 | 41 | 0.795 | 0.54 |
Source: www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo/2011/01/weodata/weoselgr.aspx , hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR_2010_EN_Table2_reprint.pdf
You can see full ranking of HDI 2010 and HDI trends in 1980 – 2010 on the following links:
