Measuring World Better Life Frontier: A Composite Indicator for OECD Better Life Index

The OECD Better Life initiative recently released a comprehensive set of 11 indicators of well-being covering a group of countries. Each individual indicator corresponds to a key topic that is essential to well-being. However, the problem of aggregating them is left to users of this dataset. Using these as individual indicators, we propose a composite indicator of overall well-being, which is intended to measure the performance of each country in terms of providing well-being to its people. The ‘benefit of the doubt’ approach (BOD), a well-known aggregation tool based on a weighed sum, assigns the most favourable weights for each entity under investigation. BOD may also be considered to evaluate the performance of each entity in terms of its efficiency. Regarding individual indicators as outputs, it constructs the benchmark production frontier from observed individual indicators. A composite indicator based on BOD equals the distance between each entity’s individual indicator and the production frontier, indicating its efficiency. It is widely considered that the well-being of a country’s people stems from its productive base, which is characterized by capital assets and social infrastructures. Thus, the productive base can be considered the input used to produce well-being, which is reflected by individual indicators. Therefore, when we apply BOD to aggregate individual well-being indicators across countries, we implicitly assume that all countries have the same productive base, as BOD addresses only the output and neglects the input. This inaccurate assumption leads to a distorted performance measure. Data envelopment analysis (DEA), in which BOD has its roots, is a tool to measure the efficiency of each entity by allowing for differences in inputs as well as outputs across entities. DEA also measures efficiency by using the distance to the production frontier; however, unlike BOD, DEA constructs the production frontier more accurately by utilizing the information of inputs as well as outputs, leading to a better performance measure. We apply DEA to aggregate 11 individual well-being indicators into a composite indicator using the World Bank’s estimates of each country’s productive base. The composite indicator based on BOD is distributed similarly to and is highly correlated with the existing Human Development Indicator (HDI). It is also positively correlated with GDP per capita. On the other hand, we show that the composite indicator based on DEA is negatively correlated with HDI as well as GDP per capita.     

Apparent Quality-of-Life in Nations: How Long and Happy People Live

Quality-of-life in nations can be measured by how long and happy people live. This is assessed by combining data on life expectancy drawn from civil registration with survey data on subjective enjoyment of life as a whole. This measure of ‘apparent’ quality-of-life is a good alternative to current indexes of ‘assumed’ quality-of-life such as the Human Development Index. Data are available for 67 nations in the 1990s. The number of Happy-Life-Years varies considerably across nations. Switzerland is at the top with 63.0 years and Moldavia at the bottom with 20.5 years. China is in the middle with an average of 46.7. Happy lifetime has risen considerably in advanced nations over the last decade.People live longer and happier in nations characterised by economic affluence, freedom and justice. Together these three societal qualities explain 66% of the cross-national variance in Happy-Life-Years. Income equality and generous social security do not appear to be required for a long and happy life.     

A value based index for measuring national quality of life

A new index of the quality of life (QOL) of nations was created. The measured variables are selected based on a universal set of human values derived from the work of Schwartz (1994). The Basic QOL Index, designed primarily to discriminate between developing countries, includes seven variables: purchasing power, homicide rate, fulfillment of basic physical needs, suicide rate, literacy rate, gross human rights violations, and deforestation. The Advanced QOL Index, designed primarily to assess QOL in highly industrialized nations, includes seven variables: physicians per capita, savings rate, per capita income, subjective well-being, percent attending college, income equality, and environmental treaties signed. Combining the two indices produced a reliable measure of QOL that systematically covers diverse human values. The nations scoring highest on the Combined QOL Index were Canada, Switzerland, Netherlands, U.S.A., and Norway, and those scoring lowest were Ethiopia and Rwanda.     

Welfare states and social mobility: How educational and social policy may affect cross-national differences in the association between occupational origins and destinations

Cross-national differences in the association between origins and destinations correspond to differences in both welfare regime type and access to post-secondary education. Socialist and social democratic welfare regimes foster a weaker origin–destination association than liberal, corporatist, or mixed regimes do. Nations with better-educated labor forces tend to also be the nations where the association between origins and destinations is weakest. Furthermore, the social and educational policy interact so that the tendency for educational access to lower the origin–destination association is most pronounced in the liberal welfare setting where the association would otherwise be greatest. Greater access is not necessarily associated with greater equality of opportunity, and we find very weak evidence that equality of educational opportunity itself is a direct influence on equality of occupational opportunity (even though nations that have a strong origin–education association also have a strong origin–destination association).     

Livability of the welfare-state

One issue in the debate on the welfare-state is whether state-care renders society more livable or not. The positive view is that people flourish in the welfare-state, the negative view is that people thrive better without. This article approaches the dispute empirically, by comparing livability of nations that differ in state-welfare-effort. The livability of nations is measured by the degree to which its citizens live long and happily. State-welfare-effect is measured by the scope of welfare-laws and the size of state-welfare-expenditures.Data on average appreciation-of-life around 1980 are available for 28 nations; mostly rich ones. Appreciation-of-life appears somewhat greater in the nations that provide most state-welfare. However, that difference is entirely due to parallel differences in economic affluence. Data on change in life-satisfaction between 1950 and 1980 are available for only 10 nations, all rich ones. Life-satisfaction did not increase more in the nations where state-welfare expanded most.     

Subnational migration in the United Kingdom: producing a consistent time series using a combination of available data and estimates

There is no single framework in place in the United Kingdom for collating and harmonizing the data on migration taking place between the subnational administrative units that constitute the home nations, together with the flows of international migration between these areas and the ‘rest of the world’. This paper proposes the construction of complete matrices of subnational migration statistics on an annual basis which can then be used to monitor migration trends throughout the UK in a comprehensive manner. The paper reviews how various ‘known’ flows are estimated by the national statistics agencies and develops estimates to fill in the gaps in the matrices. It then looks at changing patterns of migration in the UK between 2001/2002 and 2010/2011, showing that migration exhibits most activity in the middle of the decade. Flows within the home nations are the most consistent over time, while the patterns of international migration and migration across the borders of the home nations exhibit more substantial change. The latter flows, although relatively small in magnitude, have not previously been studied at the subnational level in any detail. Patterns of subnational internal and international net migration are found to be negatively correlated.     

The Impact of Social and Economic Indicators on Maternal and Child Health

As early as 1985, Rosenfield and Maine began to look at what is called the maternal child field (MCH). More than two decades later, maternal and infant mortality is still among the worst performing health indicator in resource-poor countries and regions, and it has barely changed since 1990. Although three of the eight United Nations Millennium Development Goals aim at reducing child mortality, maternal mortality, and promoting gender equality, most literature in the field is either clinical or exclusively deals with women’s health problems. In this study, I proposed an empirical model that tests the impact of gender equality, women’s human rights, and maternity care on MCH with economic and political development as background factors. The proposed model was tested by using structural equation analysis. Data were obtained from 137 developing countries. The proposed model is partially supported by the data. Empirical findings demonstrate that gender equality has a pivotal role to play in the promotion of MCH. The relationship between MCH and maternity care is found to be strong and statistically significant. This finding may permit a probable verification given the current social conditions in some developing countries, particularly the neglect of many of women’s health needs and the assignment of their primary responsibilities in childrearing. The women’s human rights hypothesis is not supported by the data. It is perhaps that human rights instruments provide a legal discourse for political functions and social welfare issues, but that the legal approach alone does not necessarily provide a moral and social foundation to ensure the implementation of social welfare and human well-being, particularly maternal and child health in developing countries. The findings also indicate the importance of economic development in predicting maternity care. Finally, a positive and statistically significant relationship is found between economic development and gender equality. Implications and limitations of the study are discussed.     

Deciphering the ‘Ethnic Penalty’ of Immigrants in Western Europe: A Cross-Classified Multilevel Analysis

While most previous research on immigrants’ assimilation refers to the residual disadvantage that remains in empirical analyses of economic outcomes as a general ‘ethnic penalty’, this current paper disentangles the ‘ethnic penalty’ by dividing it into four components: individual characteristics, country characteristics, the social environment in host country, and the policy environment in host country. This study tests the effects of these four components on three economic outcomes: employment, labor force participation, and household income. Data from the European Social Survey, the Migrant Integration Policy Index, the UN, and the World Bank are integrated here. Findings show that the main reasons for immigrants’ disadvantage in terms of labor force participation and household income are both origin and host country characteristics, while the effects of ethnic origins, social exclusion, and policies are weaker. However, ethnic origins and social exclusion actually play a central role in determining unemployment of immigrants.     

Ideology and social indicators of the quality of life

This paper explores the possibility that social-psychological, evaluative measures of social well-being/quality of life (QOL) perceptions may embody unintended ideological elements. We argue that individual QOL satisfactions are likely caused, in part, by ‘satisfactions’, or conservative orientations, vis-à-vis societal institutions. Four dependent measures of QOL attitudes-overall life satisfaction, service satisfaction, community satisfaction, and powerlessness-are derived from factor analyses and established measurement procedures. Each of these QOL indicators is found to exhibit significant bivariate associations with measures of political-economic ideology. These relationships are somewhat reduced, but persist at statistically significant levels, when socio-demographic background variables are held constant. We then discuss the implications of our results for theory and method in the social indicators field.     

Labor force composition and underemployment trends, 1969–1980

Underemployment indicators are both ‘objective’ indicators of individual well-being and social welfare and ‘normative’ indicators for programmatic use. Components of an underemployment indicator framework, the Labor Utilization Framework (LUF), are operationally defined and shown to be closely related to a family of proposed alternatives. Using CPS data, a 12-year time series of LUF indicators is developed for the U.S. labor force and its key subgroups. The across-time heterogeneity of the labor force is analyzed in relation to a ‘basic’ demographic group-by-LUF-by-time contingency, showing how the complexity of labor force structure that emerges from a multi-state indicator of underemployment can be rigorously modeled. Standard loglinear models, which focus on the temporal aspects of data from repeated cross-sectional surveys, provide the analytic technique. Changes in the demographic composition of the labor force account for about 30% of the overall period variability, and age structure has made the most important contribution to the compositional change.     

Empirical indicators of educational equity and equality: A thai case study

The focus of this paper is social indicator reporting, not the development of scientific generalization. This social indicator analysis involves the development of an extensive set of empirical indicators to show the extent of equity and equality of education. Equity and equality are viewed as distinct concepts, each with its own indicators. The set of indicators proposed is applied to Thailand in a case study. Examples of indicators used are (1) the relationship between socioeconomic background and access to preschool education, (2) the relationship between provincial wealth and opportunities for upper primary education, (3) proportion of females in lower primary schools, and (4) degree of equality among provinces in grant per pupil in primary education. The discrepancy ratio is introduced as an indicator to standardize measures of inequality and inequity. This set of indicators shows moderate levels of inequality and inequity in Thailand, with the most serious problems at the preschool, secondary, and higher education levels. Empirical indicators of this type are viewed as critically necessary for governments everywhere to enable them to chart their progress toward greater equity and equality.     

Effects of Social Network on Human Capital of Land-Lost Farmers: A Study in Zhejiang Province

The International Wellbeing Index covers two complementary measures, the Personal Wellbeing Index (PWI) and the National Wellbeing Index (NWI). The focus group study reported here tested the understanding of the NWI when translated into isiXhosa, a language spoken by 6 million South Africans, or 16% of the country’s population. A challenge for the NWI in measuring national well-being is the tendency for meaning to get ‘lost in translation’ in the wording of the instrument, owing to the disparities that exist between levels of living in developed and developing nations. The focussed discussions with native isiXhosa speakers conveyed the different shades of meaning associated with the six domains that make up the NWI. The isiXhosa keywords for the domains of social conditions, the natural environment, national security, and management of the country’s affairs (government) were readily understood, but discussants asked for further clarification of keywords for the domains relating to the economy and business. Conversations showed up the close link between personal and national well-being: discussants drew upon their personal and parochial life experiences along with their knowledge of current affairs to evaluate the nation’s quality of life. They described the social contract between citizens and their government to create a ‘caring society’ that promotes well-being across key domains of national life. Many of the reference standards used to evaluate national well-being were ones postulated to influence personal well-being (Michalos A.C, Social Indicators Research 16(4): 347–413 1985 ). The study also pointed to a potential problem for longitudinal studies if the bipolar satisfaction scale, formerly used to measure the International Wellbeing Index’s PWI and NWI, is changed to a unipolar one. Findings from this pilot study confirm the potential of the NWI as a tool for measuring national well-being cross-culturally.     

Towards a conceptualisation of woman centred care — A global review of professional standards

BackgroundWoman centred care is purported to underpin Midwifery philosophy. However, the evidence and focus of this concept within midwifery professional standards has yet to be verified. Further to this, woman centred care is, at this time, mostly depicted as a way of assisting, supporting and interacting with a woman and her family. It is however, without a substantive universally accepted definition.ObjectiveThis study aimed to review midwifery standards documents. An organised and targeted methodology was conducted to identify the approaches to woman centred care that currently underpin midwifery governance.MethodsA comprehensive and specific search for ‘woman centred care’ was conducted across a global collection of midwifery standards. A professional document was included if it represented either or all of the underpinnings of midwifery education, contained statements related to standards of practice, overall governance or any equivalence. Individual documents were initially searched for the words ‘woman centred care’, followed by ‘women centred care’, ‘patient/person centred care’ and ‘client centred care’.FindingsAn extensive review of 142 documents was undertaken. These included: thirty independent nations, thirty represented by the European Midwives Association and a further twenty-one identified through the International Confederation of Midwives (ICM). The World Health Organisation (WHO), yielded midwifery information from a further sixty-one nations. The phrase ‘woman centred care’ was located within 3.5% of the documents reviewed. Overall, five examples were found that directly referred to the actual phrase ‘woman centred care’ and one to the use of ‘person centred care’. Therefore, it was established, that at the time of this review, there was limited formal depiction of the concept of woman centred care.     

Identifying Social Trust in Cross-Country Analysis: Do We Really Measure the Same?

Many see trust as an important social resource for the welfare of individuals as well as nations. It is therefore important to be able to identify trust and explain its sources. Cross-country survey analysis has been an important tool in this respect, and often one single variable is used to identify social trust understood as trust in strangers, namely: “Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you can’t be too careful in dealing with people?” The question, however, is whether this variable captures the meaning of social trust equally well in all countries. This is investigated by comparing different measurements of trust across five clusters of countries in all parts of the world. The analysis shows that there are considerable problems associated with the use of the variable of “most can be trusted” as an indicator of trust in strangers, both in terms of strangers understood as “people you meet for the first time” and in terms of strangers understood as people of a different nationality and religion. These results question the validity of previous investigations of social trust based on international survey material. The analysis furthermore reveals that a new survey question about trust in people one is meeting for the first time is better suited as indicator of social trust in comparative analysis.     

Inequalities in Healthy Life Expectancy in Eastern Europe

Compared to the large body of research on mortality differentials between East Central Europe and the former Soviet Union, little attention has been paid to how overall population health status differs between these two country groups. This article investigates disparities in population health, measured by healthy life expectancy (HLE) between ages 20 and 74, for 23 Eastern European countries in 2008. There are substantial disparities in partial HLE between East Central Europe and the former Soviet Union, amounting to differences of 10 years on average for men and women. In addition, factors reflecting the malfunction of existing social structure are inversely associated with partial HLE. Accordingly, populations in countries where corruption, restriction of freedom, and violence are prevalent spend fewer years in good health.     

The demography of words: The global decline in non-numeric fertility preferences, 1993–2011

This paper examines the decline in non-numeric responses to questions about fertility preferences among women in the developing world. These types of response—such as ‘don’t know’ or ‘it’s up to God’—have often been interpreted through the lens of fertility transition theory as an indication that reproduction has not yet entered women’s ‘calculus of conscious choice’. However, this has yet to be investigated cross-nationally and over time. Using 19?years of data from 32 countries, we find that non-numeric fertility preferences decline most substantially in the early stages of a country’s fertility transition. Using country-specific and multilevel models, we explore the individual- and contextual-level characteristics associated with women’s likelihood of providing a non-numeric response to questions about their fertility preferences. Non-numeric fertility preferences are influenced by a host of social factors, with educational attainment and knowledge of contraception being the most robust and consistent predictors.     

Impact of Acts of Discrimination on Quality of Life Among Injecting Drug Users in Delhi, India

The study examines the association between quality of life (QOL) and discrimination perpetrated against a vulnerable population like injecting drug users (IDU). Given that QOL affects self efficacy which in turn affects behavior, it is relevant to examine QOL among IDUs in the context of HIV prevention, and to study whether discriminations and human rights abuses impact QOL in this population. A cross sectional study was conducted in two research sites in Delhi, India among 343 IDUs recruited through a respondent driven sampling. A Hindi version of the WHOQOL Bref survey along with a survey questionnaire of discrimination were used to interview participants. After controlling for demographic characteristics, experiencing physical and verbal abuse (OR: 0.46, CI 0.27–0.79),arrests and imprisonment for carrying needles and/or using drugs (OR: 0.53, CI 0.31–0.90) and lacking health information (OR: 0.49, CI 0.29–0.85)was associated with lower social QOL, while being denied health care services was associated with lower psychological QOL. The more discrimination experienced, the lower was the quality of life in the social and psychological domains. Participants’ perceived well being in the four domains was related to their living conditions, discriminatory acts and to perceptions of social support. Discriminatory acts and abuses appeared to have a greater toll on their psychological well being and social relationships, thus indicating the need for human rights advocacy in order to influence law enforcement practices and to reduce stigma, while expanding social support through an extended comprehensive IDU programme.     

A Benefit Recipiency Approach to Analysing Differences and Similarities in European Welfare Provision

In comparative welfare state research, the question of how to measure and understand cross-country differences and similarities in extents of public welfare provision has led to a major discussion about the indicators that could be used for this purpose. Much scholarly attention approaching this so-called ‘dependent variable problem’ concentrates on social expenditure or on social rights data as indicators of ‘welfare stateness’ or ‘welfare generosity’. However, recently, micro-level data on benefit receipt as another promising but hitherto underused indicator was brought into this discussion. The article at hand extends existing knowledge about the conceptual, methodological and empirical potentials and challenges of this alternative indicator compared to the two prevailing indicators. For the empirical analysis, it uses cash benefit recipiency data from the EU-SILC to investigate differences and similarities in extents of public welfare provision between 29 European countries for the period 2003–2012. The study reveals parallels to findings from research in which indicators of social expenditure and social rights are applied, but it also adds new insights beyond their cost and paper reality. This is mainly the case where priority is given to household-related assistance benefits rather than individual insurance benefits. The main conclusion of the paper is that the benefit recipiency indicator—despite not being flawless and requiring further research—complements existing knowledge on differences and similarities in welfare provision by European welfare states.     

Does Good Governance Enhance Happiness: A Cross Nation Study

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the efficiency of the countries over the period of 10 years by applying data envelopment analysis (DEA). Based on rational and factual parameters such as freedom of press, freedom of religion, percentage of export in Gross Domestic Product (GDP), index of globalization, life expectancy at birth, gender ratio etc., this paper attempts to measure the efficiency of happiness. A combination of social and economic factors has been used to measure technical efficiency. The contribution of this paper is twofold. First, it measures the relative efficiency of all the countries included in the study. The nations have been ranked as per their relative efficiency and the peer group has been formed. Second a comparison between the rich and the poor countries have been done to test empirically whether the economic growth enhances the happiness among people. Presently, more than 3,000 studies have been published on happiness and Veenhoven in 2004 created a database called World Database of Happiness. The World Database of Happiness has attempted to present the available research findings on happiness. Part of the findings on happiness in nations is available in ‘States of nations’. For the research purpose, States of Nations and the data published by have been considered. Although happiness has been quantified and the existing literature has sufficient empirical evidences of the same, in the present context, the relative efficiency has been calculated for the countries on basis of objective and subjective happiness parameters. As per the literature, happiness has two aspects (1) objective and (2) subjective. Objective parameters are external to the individuals and covers material living parameters viz. GDP growth, income, nutrition, mortality rate, literacy etc. However, Subjective indicators measure the quality of life of the individuals. These are summarized as ‘‘subjective well-being’’. The various parameters considered in the study capture different aspects of happiness. The result shows how the government can increase the happiness of the people by analyzing the behavior and expectations. People express their preference explicitly about political parties, religion believes, law and order situation, trust in official institutions etc. Although, the behavior of people largely depends upon availability of goods and services in the market, the government can make budgets according to priority or preferences of people. Another way to increase happiness can be done by analyzing the peer group, which is an outcome of DEA. This shows the nations which are similar in terms of their economic and social conditions. The government can compare the prevailing conditions in different countries that improve the condition in their respective country. This could be an effective method as some of the parameters can be replicable in order to make people happier. The limitation of this study is lack of availability of data for many countries. As the number of countries increases, a change in the relative efficiency can be observed. Therefore, a future study can be conducted where the relevant data can be collected and a more global result can be obtained.     

Social Capital Associated with Quality of Life Mediated by Employment Experiences: Evidence from a Random Sample of Rural-to-Urban Migrants in China

Working-age migrants need to possess adequate social capital in order to secure a stable and satisfactory job so that they can pursue a better quality of life (QOL). The positive relationship between social capital and vocational experiences, including successful employment, has been well established. In this study we focused on testing a multi-step mediation model linking social capital with employment experiences, and further to QOL. Survey data from rural-to-urban migrants randomly selected from Wuhan, China were analyzed. Social capital, including bonding and bridging capital, was measured using the Personal Social Capital Scale; employment experiences were measured using five job-related items; and QOL was measured using the Brief Symptoms Inventory. Structural equation modeling analysis indicated that job security and job satisfaction were positively and significantly associated with QOL, and social capital measures were significantly associated with higher QOL (primarily for males). Furthermore, job security and job satisfaction fully mediated the relationship between social capital and QOL after controlling for covariates. Findings of this study suggest the significance of social capital, job security and satisfaction in improving migrants’ QOL, implying the importance of vocational experiences in mediating the effect from social capital to QOL. If the findings can be confirmed with longitudinal data, these factors should be considered in decision making to improve rural-to-urban migrants’ QOL in China.