AMERICA COMPARED

Main QuestionsMain Questions

What is cross-national comparison?

Why compare?

Compare what?

Compare whom?

What is the correct information/data?

Remember: You can compare anything, so long as the comparison makes sense, is appropriate to the question you are asking, and you have the information needed to do the comparison.

USA Germany Poland

Does America have the greatest athletes in the world? -- To whom should we compare America?-- What information do we need to compare?

According to the official website of the Olympic Movement, between 1896 and 2010, there are 25,362 Olympic Medalists.

Does America have the greatest athletes in the world? -- To whom should we compare America?-- What information do we need to compare?

According to the official website of the Olympic Movement, between 1896 and 2010, there are 25,362 Olympic Medalists.

Team (IOC code) Total Team (IOC code) Total1  United States (USA) 2549 LAST  Afghanistan (AFG) 12  Soviet Union (URS) 1204 LAST  Barbados (BAR) 13  Germany (GER) 1099 LAST  Bermuda (BER) 14  Great Britain (GBR) 737 LAST  Burundi (BDI) 15  France (FRA) 730 LAST  Côte d'Ivoire (CIV) 16  Italy (ITA) 627 LAST  Djibouti (DJI) 17  Sweden (SWE) 604 LAST  Eritrea (ERI) 18  East Germany (GDR) 519 LAST  Guyana (GUY) 19  Hungary (HUN) 465 LAST  Iraq (IRQ) 110  Finland (FIN) 455 LAST  Kuwait (KUW) 1

—   World 58,892,8481  United States 14,119,0002  Japan 5,068,9963  People's Republic of China 4,985,4614  Germany 3,330,0325  France 2,649,3906  United Kingdom 2,174,5307  Italy 2,112,7808  Brazil 1,573,4099  Spain 1,460,25010  Canada 1,336,06811  India 1,310,17112  Russia 1,231,89313  Australia 924,84314  Mexico 874,90215  South Korea 832,512

Gross Domestic Product in USD (World Bank data 2009)

Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, Atlas method (2009 US$)

Country Name 20081 Monaco 2039002 Liechtenstein 1132103 Norway 848404 Luxembourg 819705 Denmark 585706 Switzerland 567707 Sweden 524408 San Marino 506709 Iceland 50410

10 Ireland 4981011 Netherlands 4852012 Finland 4810013 United States 47580

RANK Country Gini 2002 - 20081 Namibia 74.32 Comoros 64.33 Botswana 614 Belize 59.65 Haiti 59.56 Angola 58.67 Colombia 58.58 South Africa 57.89 Bolivia (Plurinational State of) 57.2

10 Honduras 55.367 United States 40.868 Georgia 40.869 Tunisia 40.870 Turkmenistan 40.871 Trinidad and Tobago 40.3

Economic inequality from UN Development Programme. Gini scores range from 0 to 100, where the higher the score, the greater the income inequality.

UNDP International Human Development Indicators: development indicators (for example, education, health, economic inequality) for 195 countries 1980 - 2010

World Bank World Development Indicators: 213 „economies” from 1960 – 2010

Economist Intelligence Unit Democracy Index: 2006, 2008, 2010 offers „a snapshot of the state of democracy worldwide for 165 independent states and two territories—this covers almost the entire population of the world and the vast majority of the world’s independent states (micro states are excluded).”

Freedomhouse Democracy Scores: „The survey includes both analytical reports and numerical ratings for 194 countries and 14 select territories... each country and territory is assigned a numerical rating-on a scale of 1 to 7-for political rights and an analogous rating for civil liberties; a rating of 1 indicates the highest degree of freedom and 7 the lowest level of freedom.”

Transparency International Perceptions of Corruption Global Index: „The 2010 Corruption Perceptions Index shows that nearly three quarters of the 178 countries in the index score below five, on a scale from 10 (highly clean) to 0 (highly corrupt). These results indicate a serious corruption problem.”

TRANSPARENCY INTERNATIONAL CORRUPTION INDEX 2009TRANSPARENCY INTERNATIONAL CORRUPTION INDEX 2009

Data sources common to worldwide indicators include:

-- Surveys of firms, households, and individuals

-- Expert assessments from commercial business information providers, non governmental organizations, and public sector ‐ ‐organizations

Human Development Index (HDI)

Life expectancy

at birthMean years of schooling

Rank value (years) (years)1 Norway 0.94 81.01 12.632 Australia 0.94 81.86 12.043 New Zealand 0.91 80.60 12.524 United States 0.90 79.58 12.455 Ireland 0.89 80.33 11.626 Liechtenstein 0.89 79.60 10.277 Netherlands 0.89 80.33 11.178 Canada 0.89 81.04 11.499 Sweden 0.88 81.27 11.62

10 Germany 0.88 80.21 12.2111 Japan 0.88 83.17 11.4812 Korea (Republic of) 0.88 79.80 11.6413 Switzerland 0.87 82.20 10.2714 France 0.87 81.65 10.4315 Israel 0.87 81.15 11.91

Human development index 2010 (UNDP)

HDI rank gini Rank country HDI gini 2000 - 20086 Liechtenstein 0.891 ..

17 Iceland 0.869 ..4 1 United States 0.902 40.8

15 2 Israel 0.872 39.23 3 New Zealand 0.907 36.22 4 Australia 0.937 35.2

20 5 Spain 0.863 34.75 6 Ireland 0.895 34.3

13 7 Switzerland 0.874 33.718 8 Belgium 0.867 33.014 9 France 0.872 32.78 10 Canada 0.888 32.6

12 11 Korea (Republic of) 0.877 31.67 12 Netherlands 0.890 30.9

10 13 Germany 0.885 28.316 14 Finland 0.871 26.91 15 Norway 0.938 25.89 16 Sweden 0.885 25.0

11 17 Japan 0.884 24.919 18 Denmark 0.866 24.7

Gini (income inequality) among high HDI countries

Rank Country 2008 % World

-- World 27,469,342

1 China 2,885,000 10.50

2 India 2,582,000 9.40

3 United States 1,540,000 5.61

4 Russian Federation 1,476,000 5.37

5 Korea, Dem. Rep. 1,295,000 4.716 Pakistan 921,000 3.357 Egypt, Arab Rep. 866,000 3.158 Brazil 721,000 2.629 Korea, Rep. 692,000 2.52

10 Turkey 613,000 2.2311 Indonesia 582,000 2.1212 Iraq 577,000 2.1013 Iran, Islamic Rep. 563,000 2.0514 Myanmar 513,000 1.8715 Vietnam 495,000 1.80

Military: Number in service (active and reserves)

Military expenditure (% of GDP)

Country Name 2000 2008 Change

1 Georgia 0.62 8.52 7.91

2 Saudi Arabia 10.59 8.05 -2.55

3 Oman 10.59 7.66 -2.93

4 Chad 1.91 7.31 5.41

5 Israel 7.78 6.96 -0.82

6 Jordan 6.25 5.88 -0.36

7 Yemen, Rep. 5.02 4.45 -0.57

8 United States 3.09 4.29 1.20

9 Singapore 4.64 3.95 -0.69

10 Lebanon 5.39 3.92 -1.47

According to the U.S. DoD baseline report 2009, “The Department manages a global real property portfolio consisting of more than 539,000 facilities (buildings, structures and linear structures) located on more than 5,570 sites, on approximately 29 million acres… the Department’s real property assets represent 57% of the federal government real property portfolio” (p. 2).

Of the sites, 4,742 are in the U.S., 121 are in U.S. territories, and 716 are overseas, spread over 38 countries. There are 235 sites in Germany, 123 sites in Japan, and 87 sites in South Korea.http://www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/2009Baseline.pdf

Rank Country Overall1 Norway 9.82 Iceland 9.653 Denmark 9.524 Sweden 9.5

5 New Zealand 9.266 Australia 9.227 Finland 9.198 Switzerland 9.099 Canada 9.08

10 Netherlands 8.99…

17 USA 8.18

Level of Democracy: Economist Intelligence Unit 2010

EIU 2010III Political participation27. Voter participation/turn-out for national elections. (average turnout in parliamentary elections since 2000. Turnout as proportion of population ofvoting age). 1 if consistently above 70%; 0.5 if between 50% and 70% 0 if below 50%

28. Do ethnic, religious and other minorities have a reasonable degree of autonomy and voice in the political process? 1: Yes; 0.5: Yes, but serious flaws exist; 0: No

29. Women in parliament: % of members of parliament who are women1 if more than 20% of seats; 0.5 if 10-20%; 0 if less than 10%

V Civil liberties45. Is there a free print media?1: Yes; 0.5: Pluralistic, but state-controlled media are heavily favoured. There is high degree of concentration of private ownership of national newspapers; 0: No

46. Is there freedom of expression and protest (bar only generally accepted restrictions such as banning advocacy of violence)? 1: Yes; 0.5: Minority view points are subject to some official harassment. Libel laws restrict heavily scope for free expression; 0: No