The idea that prosperity correlates with freedom is one that must have occurred to the minds of all freedom loving people. The stark contrast between East and West Germany would be the first example cited by most of us. However, one or two examples, as any scientist will say, does not prove a case.
A friend of mine with experience in teaching and travelling in third world countries, Dr. David Pike, is a member of CUSO with socialist leanings. He undertook to disprove the theory expressed in Bob's letter to Maclean's magazine. Using data supplied by Freedom House, 1982, he crossed the figures for "degree of civil liberties" with the figures for "quality of life" for 155 nations. He expected the result to be a random scatter: that there would be no correlation and no trend line.
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The result is the plot labelled "FREEPLT.DAT". Quality of life is vertical, and degree of civil liberties is horizontal. If our theory were correct, we would expect the least-square line correlating the data to slope from the upper left hand corner to the lower right hand corner. We would also expect a high correlation coefficient (meaning that most of the points are not far from the line).
What we discovered, in fact, is that there is a line with the slope we expected (though not as steep as we would like) and that the correlation coefficient is very low, less than 0.6, which in most sciences means a failed experiment.
So: We haven't proven our case, but we have accumulated some positive evidence.
Take another look at the plot. The left side of it is more descriptive than the right side. The left column represents the most free countries. That includes Canada, the U.S., Japan, U.K., Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Australia, New Zealand, Netherlands, Switzerland, Austria, Iceland, and Ireland. Most of our trading partners are in that little spot at the top left hand corner of the plot. Although you see only 8 points, many of them have been overwritted because more than one country occupied the same spot.
Together, they account for about half of the world industrial output but only 11 % of world population. Some of the less free countries, including both leftist and rightist dictatorships, are dependent on developed countries, including Moscow, for their foreign exchange (and weapons?). Why are some of the dependent countries lacking the most elementary civil liberties? Why are some not?
We don't have all the answers. Were the terms of reference in this survey too narrow? Degree of freedom, "civil liberties", is described by Freedom House as the "degree to which fair and competitive elections occur, individual and group freedoms occur in practice and a free press exists." No account is taken of trade barriers, degree of taxation, control of land ownership, redistribution of wealth, or other such economic burdens.
The data for "quality of life" was taken from the U.S. and World Development: 1982. It measures infant mortality, average longevity, and literacy. It does not measure the dictionary definition of prosperity, which is "the ability to succeed, thrive and grow." Can any politician or social scientist ever measure that?
If any Freedom Party supporters would like to take this on as a major research project (does prosperity correlate with freedom? --- define your terms please!), let us know. We would consider it a major opus, worth glory and all the rest of it. Put it on the back, --middle, --front burner.
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last updated on April 28, 2002
