The Human Development Index in Canada

We develop internationally comparable estimates of the Human Development Index (HDI) for the Canadian provinces and territories over the 2000-2014 period. The HDI is a composite index composed of three dimensions (life expectancy, education and income) measured by four indicators (life expectancy at birth, average years of education, expected years of schooling and GNI per capita). We first replicate the Canadian estimates from the most recent Human Development Report (HDR) using data from Statistics Canada. Next, we generate estimates for the provinces and territories following the same methodology and using the same Canadian data sources. We make these estimates internationally comparable by scaling each province or territory’s estimate to Canada’s in the most recent HDR. This allows the provinces and territories to be ranked in the most recent HDR international rankings for all four component variables as well as the overall HDI. The highest HDI score in 2014 among the provinces and territories belongs to Alberta, which would be fourth in the international rankings, while the lowest ranking region is Nunavut, which would be in 46th place. Overall, our report highlights the diverse human development experiences of Canadians that are concealed by Canada’s overall HDI.