Abstract
The Lumen Gini Coefficient: a satellite imagery derived human development index
Highlights
In this paper we develop an alternative measure of the distribution of 15 “human development”, called the “Lumen Gini coefficient”, that is derived without the use of monetary measures of wealth and is capable of providing a spatial depiction of differences in development within countries
20 We investigated the meaning of the Lumen Gini by determining its correlation with a wide range of national level indices, including the income Gini Coefficient (World Bank, 2010), electrification rates (International Energy Agency, 2010), Human Development Index (World Bank, 2010), Human Security Index, percent urban (World Bank), Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita (World Bank, 2010), percent living on $2 or 25 less per day (World Bank, 2010), multidimensional poverty index (World Bank, 2010), ecological footprint (Footprint Network, 2010), total primary energy consumption per Discussion Paper | Discussion Paper | Discussion Paper | Discussion Paper |
There is a wide range in the Lumen Gini Coefficient values
Summary
We conducted a study of electrification rates by overlaying DMSP nighttime lights and gridded population data. In extremely poor countries the scattergram points are aligned along the population axis with very little spread on the lighting axis (Fig. 1), indicating a dearth of outdoor lighting. In scattergrams 5 of well developed countries with low population density the data cloud forms a circular pattern pressed against the axis near the origin (Fig. 2). The scattergrams for developing countries retain the alignment of points with the population axis, but with a wider range of lighting levels (Fig. 3). The Gini coefficient is widely used to measure the dispersion of a variable across a population, region, or nation Because this Gini is calculated using observations of artificial lighting, 20 we refer to it as the Lumen Gini Coefficient. The lumen is a standardized unit indicating the quantity of visible light emitted by a source
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