What is a developed economy?
Countries with economies in which the tertiary and quaternary sectors of industry dominate are known as developed economies. This level of economic development is usually determined on the following factors:
High income per capita
"High income economies" are defined by the World Bank as countries with a Gross National Income per capita of $11,456 or more. According to the United Nations definition some high income countries may also be developing countries. Thus, a high income country may be classified as either developed or developing.
High Human Development Index (HDI)
The Human Development Index (HDI) is an index combining normalized measures of life expectancy, literacy, educational attainment, and GDP per capita for countries worldwide. The basic use of HDI is to rank countries by level of "human development", which usually also implies to determine whether a country is a developed, developing, or underdeveloped country.
High gross domestic product (GDP) per capita
Traditionally, Canada and the United States in North America, Japan in Asia, Australia and New Zealand and most countries in Northern Europe and Western Europe have been considered "developed countries". These economies generally have a per capita GDP in excess of $10,000.
For further details refer to the following links
- IMF (advanced economies)
- The Economist (quality of life survey)
- The World Factbook (developed countries)
- United Nations Statistics Division (definition)
- United Nations Statistics Division (developed regions)
- World Bank (high-income economies)
