Affiliations: [a] Rice University, TX, USA | [b] Mississippi State University, MS, USA
Correspondence:
[*]
Corresponding author: Rice University Sociology
MS-28, 6100 Main St., Houston, TX 77005, USA. Tel.: +1 713 348 4459; Fax: +1 713
348 5296; E-mail: [email protected]
Abstract: Understanding human development at the international, regional, and national
level is essential to the understanding of the needs and wants of vast
populations around the world. Since the late 1980's the United Nation's
Development Program (UNDP) has published hundreds of reports on development at a
variety of geographic extents. This project aims to apply the United Nation's
Human Development Index (HDI) to the United States in order to create a
sub-national HDI for the measurement of US counties. Due to the inherent spatial
methodology in the development of the HDI, this project further introduces the
use of geographic information systems tools in hopes of better capturing the
results of the development index and employs spatial statistics as a way of
identifying clusters of high and low development. The results report high
regional, state, and county variation in all of the measures and outcomes
associated with the sub-national HDI.
Keywords: Human development, spatial analysis, spatial statistics, US
