The Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite measure of a country's average achievements in three basic aspects of human development:
-Health
-Knowledge
-Standard of living
The human development index (HDI) is a composite index that measures the average achievement in a country in three basic dimensions of human development: a long and healthy life, as measured by life expectancy at birth; knowledge, as measured by the adult literacy rate and the combined gross enrollment ratio for primary, secondary, and tertiary schools; and a decent standard of living, as measured by (the log of) GDP per capita in purchasing power parity US dollars (UNDP, 2006).
The HDI is today widely used in academia, in the media, and in policy circles to measure and compare progress in human development between countries and over time.