Report Shows Large Disparities Among Californians
The first-ever California Human Development Report reveals widening differences among ordinary Californians in the areas of health, education and income.
A Portrait of California, a report by the American Human Development Project, and funded in part by United Ways of California, provides an easy-to-understand composite number to measure the well-being of Californians in the areas of health, education and income. Researchers used the internationally-recognized Human Development Index (HD Index) to rank how Californians are doing against key benchmarks, broken out by demographic, geographic and other distinctions.
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An alternative to the GDP as a measure of well-being, the American Human Development Index is calculated using standard government data that is weighted equally to come up with a composite score, with 10 being the highest possible score. These include life expectancy at birth and mortality rates to measure health, age of school enrollment and educational degree attainment to measure education, and median earnings to measure people’s standard of living/income.
While California's overall score of 5.46 is better than the nation's 5.09, a great deal of variation exists across local geography, ethnicity and gender.
Regional Fact Sheets
- Los Angeles (HD Index score of 5.52)
- Sacramento (HD Index score of 5.66)
- San Diego (HD Index score of 5.80)
- San Francisco (HD Index Score of 6.97)
- Riverside-San Bernardino (HD Index Score of 4.58)
- San Joaquin Valley region (HD Index Score of 3.84)
Mapping Tool
Click on the image below or go here for the Human Development Index map.
Click here for the Human Development Index by County Groups (PUMAs) in California
Five Californias
The report sorts the findings into Five Californias, which are not geographic designations, but rather groupings of California residents in terms of their life circumstances and rankings on the HDI.
Key Statewide Findings
Find key statewide Health, Education and Income findings from the report.
A Plan of Actions
A Portrait of California also highlights things Californians can do to secure human development successes today while setting the stage for significant budget savings and improved well-being tomorrow. These include investing in public health campaigns and food subsidies for fruits and vegetables, investing in preschool and targeting the worst performing high schools that have the highest dropout rates, and taking steps to address gender equality and wage discrimination in the workplace.