Title: Issues of convergence of alternative measures of well-being - a cross-country analysis

Authors: Swati Sinha Babu

Addresses: Department of Economics, Sidho-Kanho-Birsha University, Purulia-723104, West Bengal, India

Abstract: Measurement of welfare has been a much-debated issue. To take into account the level of well-being together with the inequality in well being, a social welfare function is much needed, while formulating or evaluating social and economic policies. In this paper we have constructed a model of social welfare and established its link with environmentally adjusted net domestic product and Hamiltonian function. We have also constructed some indices of well-being and assessed the extent of convergence across some selected countries with respect to the constructed indices. To analyse the progress made by these countries in achieving the SDGs we have computed the distance to targets. The results indicate that uniformity has been achieved in well-being levels as countries with lower well-being have caught up with relatively advanced countries. Further, we fail to find a single goal for which the target proposed by agenda 30 has been achieved.

Keywords: convergence; physical quality of life index; PQLI; inequality adjusted welfare estimate; IAWE; sustainable development goals; SDGs; social welfare function.

DOI: 10.1504/IJGE.2024.139270

International Journal of Green Economics, 2024 Vol.18 No.2, pp.127 - 158

Accepted: 24 Mar 2024
Published online: 28 Jun 2024 *

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