Question

State with reasons whether you agree or not.

HDI does not have any limitations.

Answer 1

The given statement is incorrect. HDI or Human Development Index refers to the index used for measuring the economic development of a country. Although it is an important and the most widely used indicator to measure the economic development, it suffers from various limitations. The following are some of its limitations.
1. Incomplete Index- According to some economists such as Professor Amartyasen, HDI is an imperfect and incomplete index of human development and the quality of life. This is because the complications of human development cannot be captured in simple numbers. Thus, HDI in its efforts to summarize the human development in numerical terms fails to capture the reality of human development.
2. Ignores inequality- HDI with its focus on three main indicators i.e. life expectancy, literacy and GDP, does not concentrates on the problem of inequality. Thus, inequality which is major issue in many countries gets neglected while judging economic development through HDI.
3. Ignores other factors- HDI ignores many other factors of human development such as infant mortality, health and nutrition etc. This is a major drawback of HDI as these indicators play a major role in human development of a country.