Which countries have the best, and worst, living standards?

The 2020s have brought a degree of chaos not seen in decades. A pandemic was followed by a full-scale war in Europe; both sent food and fuel prices surging. Extreme weather events have shown that climate change is beginning to bite. The phrase “unprecedented times” soon sounded worn and vacuous.

This all took a toll on global standards of living. One measure of this, the un’s Human Development Index (hdi), fell in 2020 for the first time since its launch in 1990. It fell again in 2021. The hdi is one of the most widely used measures of countries’ development, after gdp. It gauges progress in terms of societal outcomes, including life expectancy at birth, expected and average years of schooling and gross national income per person. The latest figures, released on March 13th, show that the global hdi is rising again, but progress has been slow and uneven. Our table below shows how the 194 countries tracked by the un compare.

Switzerland topped the charts for a second consecutive year. Its overall score is boosted by high incomes and long life expectancies. Other countries in western Europe have some of the highest scores. Some parts of Asia also do well, with Hong Kong and Singapore making it to the top ten. Elsewhere it is bleaker: countries such as Peru, Colombia, Libya and Lebanon have made little progress since 2019. Living standards in Ukraine and Russia have also dropped: the countries fell by 23 and four places respectively between 2021 and 2022. War-torn Yemen, poor and indebted Belize, and Micronesia, an island country at risk of being swallowed by rising sea levels, all peaked in 2010 and have declined every year since.

 

Human Development Index, 2022

 

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Index score,
1=most developed

Life expectancy
at birth, years

Expected years
of schooling

Gross national income per person, $*
1 Switzerland 0.97 84.3 16.6 69,433
 
2 Norway 0.97 83.4 18.6 69,190
 
3 Iceland 0.96 82.8 19.1 54,688
 
4 Hong Kong 0.96 84.3 17.8 62,486
 
5 Denmark 0.95 81.9 18.8 62,019
 
5 Sweden 0.95 83.5 19.0 56,996
 
7 Germany 0.95 81.0 17.3 55,340
 
7 Ireland 0.95 82.7 19.1 87,468
 
9 Singapore 0.95 84.1 16.9 88,761
 
10 Australia 0.95 83.6 21.1 49,257
 
10 Netherlands 0.95 82.5 18.6 57,278
 
12 Belgium 0.94 82.3 18.9 53,644
 
12 Finland 0.94 82.4 19.2 49,522
 
12 Liechtenstein 0.94 84.7 15.5 146,673
 
15 Britain 0.94 82.2 17.6 46,624
 
16 New Zealand 0.94 83.0 19.7 43,665
 
17 United Arab Emirates 0.94 79.2 17.2 74,104
 
18 Canada 0.94 82.8 16.0 48,444
 
19 South Korea 0.93 84.0 16.5 46,026
 
20 Luxembourg 0.93 82.6 14.2 78,554
 
20 United States 0.93 78.2 16.4 65,565
 
22 Austria 0.93 82.4 16.4 56,530
 
22 Slovenia 0.93 82.1 17.4 41,587
 
24 Japan 0.92 84.8 15.5 43,644
 
25 Israel 0.92 82.6 15.0 43,588
 
25 Malta 0.92 83.7 15.9 44,464
 
27 Spain 0.91 83.9 17.8 40,043
 
28 France 0.91 83.2 16.0 47,379
 
29 Cyprus 0.91 81.9 16.2 40,137
 
30 Italy 0.91 84.1 16.7 44,284
 
31 Estonia 0.90 79.2 15.9 37,152
 
32 Czechia 0.90 78.1 16.3 39,945
 
33 Greece 0.89 80.6 20.0 31,382
 
34 Bahrain 0.89 79.2 16.3 48,731
 
35 Andorra 0.88 83.6 12.8 54,233
 
36 Poland 0.88 77.0 15.9 35,151
 
37 Latvia 0.88 75.9 16.6 32,083
 
37 Lithuania 0.88 74.3 16.4 38,131
 
39 Croatia 0.88 79.2 15.6 34,324
 
40 Qatar 0.88 81.6 13.3 95,944
 
40 Saudi Arabia 0.88 77.9 15.2 50,620
 
42 Portugal 0.87 82.2 16.8 35,315
 
43 San Marino 0.87 83.4 12.4 57,687
 
44 Chile 0.86 79.5 16.8 24,431
 
45 Slovakia 0.85 75.3 14.7 32,171
 
45 Turkey 0.85 78.5 19.7 32,834
 
47 Hungary 0.85 75.0 15.1 34,196
 
48 Argentina 0.85 76.1 19.0 22,048
 
49 Kuwait 0.85 80.3 15.7 56,729