An empirical note on inequality in the world development indicators

A broad range of inequality measures is used to examine inter-country inequality in two highly correlated indicators of development, the per capita real income (Y) and the Human Development Index (HDI). The difference in the degree of inequality in Y and the HDI is found to be highly sensitive to the inequality index. Wolfson's index reflected high inter-country inequality in both Y and the HDI. Several other indexes also measured high inequality in Y and the HDI at varying levels. The entropy class of measures exhibited a high inequality in Y but negligible inequality in the HDI.