Regional Ranking:
Regional Analysis: The Americas
The countries of North, Central, and South America vary widely in terms of their overall prosperity rankings, with Canada at sixth place and Honduras at 87th. The region contains two of the world’s wealthiest economies, the United States and Canada, followed by a series of middle and low-income countries. But one common thread can be discerned: almost all of the countries in the region perform better on the income side of the Index than on the wellbeing side (please see definitions, left).
The United States and Canada have remained in their top positions over the last three years – tenth and sixth, respectively. But their southern neighbours present a mixed picture. Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, and Venezuela have consistently risen in ranking; Mexico, Costa Rica, Ecuador, and Honduras have all fallen.
The region-wide gap between income and wellbeing is largely attributed to the performance of these countries in the Governance and Social Capital sub-indices. On the income variables in the Governance sub-index, countries in the Americas perform particularly well on political rights and democracy, with the exception of Venezuela, which is below average on both. But some of the variables that contribute to the wellbeing side of the Governance sub-index are largely below the global average – confidence in elections, the judiciary, the military, and the national government is especially low across the region. The same is true of the wellbeing variables in the Social Capital sub-index, in which the majority of countries in the region experience low levels of trust, and relatively low marriage rates.