The Cato Institute recently released its annual report on the Human Freedom Index. The index combines measures of economic freedom with measures of personal freedom. The report states:
The Human Freedom Index (HFI) presents a broad measure of human freedom, understood as the absence of coercive constraint.
I’m guessing that the authors, being good scholars, probably wrestled a little with distinguishing between economic freedom and personal freedom. To have effective freedom of the press, for example, you need to be able to have some economic freedom: the freedom to buy paper and printing presses or, in today’s world, the freedom to subscribe to an internet provider and, if the web publication is big enough, the freedom to hire people to write for the web site.
Where does the United States stand? The title tells you: we’re number 17 in a group of 165 countries. So were just a hair short of being in the top 10 percent.
The authors, Ian Vásquez, Matthew D. Mitchell, Ryan Murphy, and Guillermina Sutter Schneider, start with some bad news: freedom worldwide is lower than it was in 2019. They write:
On a scale of 0 to 10, where 10 represents more freedom, the average human freedom rating for 165 jurisdictions fell from 6.98 in 2019 to 6.76 in 2020 and to 6.73 in 2021, and then increased in 2022 to 6.82. On the basis of that coverage, 87.4 percent of the world’s population saw a fall in human freedom from 2019 to 2022, with many more jurisdictions decreasing (130) than increasing (28) their ratings and 7 remaining unchanged. The sharp decline in freedom that began in 2020 comes after years of slow descent following a high point in 2007. In the third year of the pandemic, global freedom remained at a level far below what it was in 2000.
Here are the top 10, in order:
Switzerland, New Zealand, Denmark, Luxembourg, Ireland, and Finland (the first 6), and then Australia, Iceland, and Sweden (tied at 7), and Estonia at 10.
They continue:
Selected jurisdictions rank as follows: Canada (11), Japan (12), Germany (14), United Kingdom and United States (tied at 17), Taiwan (19), Chile (31), South Korea (32), France (34), Brazil (70), South Africa (73), Argentina (80), Mexico (94), India (110), Ukraine (122), Nigeria (126), Russia (139), Turkey (142), China (150), Saudi Arabia (155), Venezuela (159), and Iran (163). Out of 10 regions, those with the highest levels of freedom are North America (Canada and the United States), Western Europe, and Oceania. The lowest levels are in the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Asia. Women-specific freedoms, as measured by five indicators in the index, are strongest in North America, Western Europe, and East Asia and are least protected in the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, and South Asia.
Notice that Ukraine is pretty unfree and is only 17 countries higher than Russia. Is there a connection between human freedom and other important measures of human well-being? Yes, big-time. They write:
Jurisdictions in the top quartile of freedom enjoy a significantly higher average per capita income ($56,366) than those in other quartiles; the average per capita income in the least free quartile is $15,826. The HFI also finds a strong, positive relationship between human freedom and democracy, and between human freedom and a range of human well-being indicators including tolerance, charitable giving, life expectancy, and environmental health, among other measures.
The report is long. One nice thing about it is that you can choose a country and then see all of the measures for that country.
Is the index perfect? Not at all. One check I did was to see how it rated freedom of speech in the UK. If you’ve followed the UK lately, you might know that police can come to your door and arrest you for posting thoughts that other people don’t like. Here’s an instance. Yet “Media and expression” gets a 10.0 (the highest possible) from Freedom House. Similarly, in Canada, where I come from, one man was hauled before a so-called “human rights tribunal” for showing hatred and contempt towards homosexuals. What the person did was write a letter to a local newspaper to complain about pro-gay groups “using taxpayer money to propagandize young children” in government schools. Yet the same Freedom House gives Canada a 10.0 rating on “Media and expression.” John Leo, in National Review Online, June 20, 2008, wrote:
After nearly six years of hearings, delays, and argument about the letter, the tribunal convicted him and his group, the Concerned Christian Coalition. As punishment, Boissoin was ordered to pay a hefty fine, apologize in writing and never again make any negative remarks about homosexuality in speeches, on the Internet, or anywhere else. He refuses to comply.
So, as I say, not a perfect index of freedom.
