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Metrics
2019 Social Progress Index
Announcing the 2019 Social Progress Index ... an initiative to have a metric that is more meaningful than GDP
Peter Burgess
hellosocialprogress Global, New index, News & Events, Sustainable Development Goals, Uncategorized September 18, 2019 2 Minutes
We have just released the 2019 Social Progress Index results, which provide comprehensive new insights into what life is really like for more than 7 billion people across 149 countries around the world. The complete findings our available at www.socialprogress.org – check them out to see where your country ranks?
The Social Progress index is the first holistic measure of a country’s social and environmental performance that is independent of economic factors, and serves as a complement to economic measures like GDP to understand the true state of a society. This year, for the first time, we are able to compare six years of social progress data, allowing us to examine global, regional, and national trends. The index captures outcomes related to all 17 Sustainable Development Goals and reveals that, if current trends continue the world will not achieve the goals until 2073.
In general, the world is improving. Since 2014, the world average score increased from 61.80 to 64.47, and there has been improvement on eight of 12 social progress components. Despite this overall progress, Personal Rights, have gone backwards since 2014, while the world has stagnated on Personal Safety and Access to Basic Knowledge. Norway ranks first in the world on social progress with a score of 90.95. Norway has improved by 2.38 points since 2014, more than any of its Nordic neighbors. 137 of 149 ranked countries have seen some progress since 2014, with several countries, including The Gambia, Nepal and Sierra Leone, demonstrating significant improvement. There are important outliers that have declined on social progress. Most notably, the United States continues to backslide, declining both in absolute terms and relative to its wealthy, world-power peers, ranking just 26th in social progress.
These are just some of the headline findings of the 2019 Social Progress Index. Go to www.socialprogress.org to explore the full results and interactive data revealing which countries are excelling at turning their GDP into better quality of life… and who is falling behind. Download the full 2019 dataset – complete with six years of historical data – to learn more about key trends in your country and around the world. You can also share the news of the 2019 Social Progress Index by tagging @socprogress, @socialprogressimperative.
Our team works year-round to build the Social Progress Index in order to deliver the most accurate possible picture of quality of life around the world. This work would not be possible without the generous support of our partners and of social progress champions like you. As you explore the 2019 Social Progress Index and find value in its insights, please make a gift to help us continue to improve our work and provide rigorous, actionable social data to decision-makers around the world.
Thank you for your continued support!