Living an economy with high levels of economic freedom reflect areas that have Geiger incomes, longer life expectancies and less unemployment. (Economic freedom 2011) The Heritage Foundation, in collaboration with the Wall Street Journal publishes the Index of Economic Freedom. This publication reveals the results of measuring economic freedom of different countries in the world, as well as ranking them. The Heritage Foundation includes multiple components when measuring economic freedom; some of these components include levels of business, trade, labor freedom, and government spending.
This essay will focus on the relationship of economic freedoms and wealth as well as take a closer look at the country of Haiti. Economic freedom is a measure of a country freedom to invest, produce, consume and operate in its own fashion. (Agar 2010) The Heritage Foundation in collaboration with Wall Street put together a publication titled the Index of Economic Freedom. This publication has a conclusive list of countries and is rated on a scale of 0-100. On the index of economic freedom, those with higher measurements have higher levels of economic freedom.
Some countries such as Syria and Libya are still developing making it very hard to measure their economic freedom. Typically the wealthier a entry is the higher the level of economic freedom. Some of the least economic free countries are Libya and Venezuela. (Safari 2010) The increase in government involvement lowers the GAP per capita of a country. Too much government involvement hinders the measures of economic freedom. Countries with higher levels of economic freedom outperform those with lower levels.
Some areas that these countries outperform in include, health care, education, employment, private institutions, poverty and a few others. Unfortunately, according to the 2013 Index of Economic Freedom the growth in economic freedom has been improving slowly. In fact, only 31 countries have increased their economic freedom by 1 point or more. (Index of Economic Freedom 2013) Economy turmoil and recessions have him many countries. These occurrences have altered government spending for the best in most cases.
However, in some countries tailored to increase minimum wages and control the labor market NAS reflected in little to no growth in economic freedom. Colombia, Indonesia, Jordan, Poland, and the United Arab Emirates have had steady growth in economic freedom over the past five years. (Index of Economic Freedom 2013) The United States and Ireland as well as Guiana have had a decline in economic freedom for five consecutive years. Hong Kong leads the index as having the most economic freedom.
Singapore, New Zealand, Australia and Switzerland also top the list. These countries demonstrate that they have put in force policies that promote economic freedom. Haiti is number 152 on the 2013 Index of Economic Freedom. The country ranking is so low it is classified as repressed. Wait’s actual economic freedom score is 48. 1 . Due to poor management of government spending and labor freedom the country has seen almost a 3 point drop in rating from last year’s data. Haiti, officially named the Republic of Haiti is a Caribbean country.
Haiti has made much history by being the first black led country as well as the first independent nation of Latin America and the Caribbean. Haiti is among the poorest countries in the Americas and has a political violence rate that has led to government instability. Haiti has had a long history of destructive earthquakes. Its most recent earthquake in 2010 still has the country trying to recover from the destructive tragedy. The 2010 earthquake caused severe damage to the Port Au Prince area. This earthquake killed over 220,000 natives.
Countless numbers of homes were destroyed leaving thousands of people homeless. Businesses were also destroyed causing an even larger deficit in the already struggling economy. Haiti has received a substantial amount of aid from the international community, in hopes of helping with this tragedy. New investments and effective policymaking has been deterred in Haiti due to the poor leadership and weak foundations of law. (Index of Economic Freedom 2013) Michel Martially is Wait’s current president and was elected in 2011. The leader of he suffering country has little support and is battling serious obstacles.