Human Development Index of Latin America and the Caribbean

    The Human Development Index is a measurement tool developed by the United Nations Development Programme utilized to rank all the countries in the world by three different factors: life expectancy, educational attainment, and adjusted real income. Using these three factors to measure development in different countries is a balanced way to measure not only some of the economic data in a country, but also to measure quality of life and how the economic factors actually affect the people in a country.

    In the geo map shown below, Latin American countries are contrasted in ranges by their HDI values. The ranges of HDI begin with 0.79 - 0.855 (Very High), 0.752 - 0.788 (High), 0.709 - 0.751 (Medium), and 0.535 - 0.692 (Low). The data range with the largest data range is range of 0.79 - 0.855 (Very High) with 10 out of the 34 countries with available data. The country in Latin America with the highest HDI value is the Republic of Chile, with an HDI value of 0.855. This value represents a high level of education averaging 10.9 years of education and an expected 16.7 years of schooling in the country. Chile also a much higher life expectancy to other countries in Latin America and the Caribbean of 78.9 years. The country with lowest HDI value in Latin America and the Caribbean is Haiti with an HDI value of 0.535. This data has to be viewed in context because of the fatal earthquake in 2010 that significantly decreased the life expectancy of the country as well as destroying a lot of the country's infrastructure. Haiti still has not fully recovered from the earthquake as public unrest and political disruption is still prevalent in 2022. 

    An interesting trend in HDI values is in Central America where the countries of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, Belize, and El Salvador all fall into the 0.535 - 0.692 (Low) range where both Panama and Costa Rica are in the 0.79 - 0.855 (Very High) range. An explanation for this would be the history of armed conflicts in the region. The economic upheavals and terrible conditions of life created by armed conflicts that mainly occurred in the 1960-1990s are still show today in the law HDI valued countries. Countries such as Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala all experienced large scale, violent political upheavals in these armed conflicts. While Panama also experienced a military intervention by the U.S., it was a direct operation that did not create lasting violence throughout the country. While the country has a very high HDI value, it is largely due to the economic disparities in the country. Since the HDI utilizes an average adjusted income, it can simply mean that there is an extremely wealthy elite of the country and a majority of low-income people in the population. Costa Rica on the other hand has a more balanced economy and has abolished its military, putting more emphasis on subsidizing healthcare and housing for its population. 

    Some countries in Latin America and the Caribbean such as Chile and Argentina have focused government spending on education with public university in Argentina free of charge. Chile has heavily invested into education in its country, spending a much larger portion of its GDP on higher education than other Latin American countries