The UN has just published an update to its Human Development Index (HDI), the league table that compares living standards in all the world’s countries.
At the top of the Index sits Iceland, which the UN believes has the world’s highest living standards but which most other observers think is basically bankrupt (public debt is running at over $30,000 per head). In 5th place is Ireland, also in dire straits as foreign investors – the mainstay of the recent boom – pull out and the government runs out of money to pay off its mountainous debts.
I don’t know about you, but if I was Norwegian, Canadian or Australian, and therefore enjoying the 2nd, 3rd and 4th highest living standards in the world, the curse of the HDI would be making me very uneasy indeed.
