Development: US fails to measure up on ‘human index’
By Ashley Seager
The Guardian
July 17, 2008
Despite spending $230m (£115m) an hour on healthcare, Americans live shorter lives than citizens of almost every other developed country. And while it has the second-highest income per head in the world, the United States ranks 42nd in terms of life expectancy.
These are some of the startling conclusions from a major new report which attempts to explain why the world’s number-one economy has slipped to 12th place – from 2nd in 1990- in terms of human development.
The American Human Development Report, which applies rankings of health, education and income to the US, paints a surprising picture of a country that spends well over $5bn each day on healthcare – more per person than any other country.
The report, Measure of America, was funded by Oxfam America, the Conrad Hilton Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. It shows each of the 11 countries that rank higher than the US in human development has a lower per-capita income.
Those countries score better on the health and knowledge indices that make up the overall human development index (HDI), which is calculated each year by the United Nations Development Programme.
One of the main problems faced by the US, says the report, is that one in six Americans, or about 47 million people, are not covered by health insurance and so have limited access to healthcare.
The US has a higher percentage of children living in poverty than any of the world’s richest countries.
It also reveals 14% of the population – some 40 million Americans – lack the literacy skills to perform simple, everyday tasks such as understanding newspaper articles and instruction manuals.
Inequality remains stark. The richest fifth of Americans earn on average $168,170 a year, almost 15 times the average of the lowest fifth, who make do with $11,352.
The US also ranks first among the 30 rich countries of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development in terms of the number of people in prison, both in absolute terms and as a percentage of the total population. It has 5% of the world’s people but 24% of its prisoners.
“Human development is concerned with what I take to be the basic development idea: namely, advancing the richness of human life, rather than the richness of the economy in which human beings live, which is only a part of it,” said the Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen, who developed the HDI in 1990.
“We get in this report … an evaluation of what the limitations of human development are in the US but also … how the relative place of America has been slipping in comparison with other countries over recent years.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2008/jul/17/internationalaidanddevelopment.usa
And…
Testimony before the Joint Economic Committee
By Kristen Lewis
American Human Development Project
July 23, 2008
It is important to note that the U.S. has higher income scores than every country but Luxembourg on the global scale – we’re still #2 in income. But the eleven countries ahead of us – particularly fast-moving countries like Australia and Ireland – have been more successful and efficient in transforming income into positive health and education outcomes for their people.
Based on the data in the American Human Development Index and the information and analysis in the American Human Development Report, a steady, broad-based advance of human development in the United States as well as greater security for middle class families will require attention to several priorities.
- For Americans to live longer, healthier lives as well as remain solvent when serious illness strikes, it is obvious from the report that progress depends in large part on a comprehensive resolution of the problem of health insurance.
- The days when basic skills were sufficient to ensure a life of reasonable economic security and full participation in society are past; the labor market today is unkind to those who lack high school diplomas, and jobs that afford financial security increasingly require college degrees.
- For Americans to sustain, or obtain, a decent standard of living, the wages and opportunities of millions of Americans must improve. Growing inequality in income distribution and wealth raises a profound question for Americans: Can the uniquely middle-class nation that emerged in the twentieth century survive into the twenty-first century? Or is it fracturing into a land of great extremes?
http://jec.senate.gov/index.cfm?FuseAction=Hearings.HearingsCalendar&ContentRecord_id=4b4275bc-d7b2-8563-4faf-a21bf4898ba4
American Human Development Project:
http://www.measureofamerica.org/
“The Measure of America,” Executive Summary:
http://measureofamerica.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/ahdr-execsumm.pdf
“The American Human Development Project’s mission is to stimulate fact-based public debate about and political attention to human development issues in the United States and to empower people to hold elected officials accountable for progress on issues we all care about: health, education and income.”
From the testimony of Harvard Law School Professor Elizabeth Warren (also available at the jec.senate.gov link above): “Seven years of flat or declining wages, seven years of increasing costs, and seven years of mounting debts have placed unprecedented stress on the ordinary families. By every critical financial measure, these families are losing ground. Without changes in critical economic policies, the strong middle class that has been the backbone of the American economy and the American democracy is in jeopardy.”
When we are addressing the narrower problem of health insurance for everyone, does the broader issue of human development really matter? Well, yes, and here’s why.
The current national debate on reform has concentrated on various models designed to provide insurance coverage to more people. Several policies would fall short of universal coverage, but, to make matters worse, other recommendations accelerate the transition to a market of underinsurance products. Increasing the number of individuals with nominal but inadequate health care coverage defeats one major goal of improving human development within the United States.
In this political season, we need to assess candidates based on whether their policies are merely gimmicks designed to look like they are addressing problems such as the uninsured, or if their policies truly are based on the fundamental goal of improving human development.
Those who are dedicated to human development will make every effort to see that everyone does have health care coverage that actually works. They’ll also support policies that address our serious deficiencies in education and in income levels.
Providing health care alone without improving human development will only serve to be certain that we will remain number one in incarcerating our people. We have more than enough national wealth to be number one in human development.
We should ask our politicians to show us precisely how their policies would improve human development – realizing the dreams of the middle class for a greater number of us. If they don’t provide us with truly concrete proposals, then ask them what plans they have to increase the capacity of our prisons. If they have a well-thought-out answer for that, then maybe we should look elsewhere for candidates with a greater sense of social solidarity.
