Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
List of developed countries on wikipedia. Interesting, have been to several on the list and I'm a little surprised by the rankings of some.
Then again I only have a rough idea of the criteria. What do you make of it?
1 Norway
2 Australia
3 Netherlands
4 United States
5 New Zealand
6 Canada
7 Ireland
8 Liechtenstein
9 Germany
10 Sweden
11 Switzerland
12 Japan
13 Hong Kong
14 Iceland
15 South Korea
16 Denmark
17 Israel
18 Belgium
19 Austria
20 France
To be honest the only country that surprises me on this list is Ireland: I guess its high ranking on here is a hangover from the Celtic Tiger days. I'd imagine if you were to do the rankings again it would come out different. However, despite its current economic problems it still remains a country with very good indicators on health and education, so perhaps it is still accurate.
The list is based on HDI (Human Development Index) rankings, which take into account quality of life issues such as life expectancy, literacy, health care etc as well as pure GDP/Income. Consequently very "rich" countries with high levels of inequality and factors such as poor human rights records such as Qatar or the UAE don't get a look in.
Sad reflection on the state of things that the UK isn't even in the top 20 anymore. According to the list, we're at #28, just ahead of Greece, but below the Czech Republic, Spain and Italy.
The HDI is a flawed mechanism.. it will surprise people to know the biggest factor when it comes to the HDI is school years, which is why you get the UK just above Greece, but below the Czech Republic, and the US above Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, Germany, France etc.
The HDI is a flawed mechanism.. it will surprise people to know the biggest factor when it comes to the HDI is school years, which is why you get the UK just above Greece, but below the Czech Republic, and the US above Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, Germany, France etc.
Interesting. That would explain our shockingly bad ranking then: I know things have really gone downhill in the UK since 2007, but I still find it hard to beleive we're now a "less developed" country than the Czech Republic or Spain.
Interesting. That would explain our shockingly bad ranking then: I know things have really gone downhill in the UK since 2007, but I still find it hard to beleive we're now a "less developed" country than the Czech Republic or Spain.
The HDI is a flawed mechanism.. it will surprise people to know the biggest factor when it comes to the HDI is school years, which is why you get the UK just above Greece, but below the Czech Republic, and the US above Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, Germany, France etc.
Interesting. That would explain our shockingly bad ranking then: I know things have really gone downhill in the UK since 2007, but I still find it hard to beleive we're now a "less developed" country than the Czech Republic or Spain.
----
Spain went over UK and Italy some 4 or 5 years ago, but now I guess we are below the Republic of Congo. During eight years we had Mr. Bean as President, go and figure.
They allow you to fiddle with the measures some for alternate forms of HDI. So if you take the education index completely out the top 20 become
1 Qatar
2 Liechtenstein
"Hong Kong" - Not really an independent country
3 Singapore
4 Norway
5 Luxembourg
6 Switzerland
7 Japan
8 UAE
9 Australia
10 Sweden
11 Andorra
12 Netherlands
13 Austria
14 Canada
15 Brunei
16 USA
17 Germany
18 France
19 Iceland
20 UK
Not sure that's more valid. Placing the UK below Brunei I imagine is also not what people had in mine, but you do get in the top 20.
Going by the normal HDI, but adding three of their four inequality measures, I got
1. Norway
2. Australia
3. Netherlands
4. Ireland
5. Sweden
6. Germany
7. Canada
8. Switzerland
9. Iceland
10. Denmark
11. Slovenia
12. Finland
13. Austria
14. Belgium
15. USA
16. France
17. Spain
18. Israel
19. Czech Republic
20. South Korea
But there are several nations where they did not measure inequality. Although Britain wasn't among those not listed when you just do "all but Gini Index."
I did find a way to get Britain up to seventh. Although it involved an odd mix of factors that put them below Botswana and above the Netherlands.
Note: I've decided this week I'm not limiting myself to the weekend, hopefully though I'll go back to that to avoid overdoing it.
Last edited by Thomas R.; 04-12-2012 at 07:48 AM..
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
