United States

Did You Know?

Population
304.2
mil.
Visitors per year
58.0
mil.
Renewable energy
5.65
%

How’s Life?

The United States performs very well in overall measures of well-being, as shown by the fact that it ranks among the top countries in a large number of topics in the Better Life Index.

Money, while it cannot buy happiness, is an important means to achieving higher living standards. In the United States, the average household earned 37 690 USD in 2008, much more than the OECD average.

In terms of employment, nearly 67% of people aged 15 to 64 in the United States have a paid job. People in the United States work 1768 hours a year, more than in other OECD countries. 73% of mothers are employed after their children begin school, suggesting that women are able to successfully balance family and career.

Having a good education is an important requisite to finding a job. In the United States, 89% of adults aged 25 to 64 have earned the equivalent of a high-school diploma, higher than the OECD average. As to the quality of its educational system, the average student scored 500 out of 600 in reading ability according to the latest PISA student-assessment programme, slightly higher than the OECD average.

In terms of health, life expectancy at birth in the United States is 77.9 years, more than one year below the OECD average. The level of atmospheric PM10 – tiny air pollutant particles small enough to enter and cause damage to the lungs – is 19 micrograms per cubic meter, and is lower than levels found in most OECD countries.

Concerning the public sphere, there is a strong sense of community and high levels of civic participation in the United States. 92% of people believe that they know someone they could rely on in a time of need, just above the OECD average of 91%. Voter turnout, a measure of public trust in government and of citizens' participation in the political process, was 90% during recent elections; this figure is also higher than the OECD average of 72%. In regards to crime, only 2% of people reported falling victim to assault over the previous 12 months.

When asked, 70% of people in the United States said they were satisfied with their life, well above the OECD average of 59%.

These findings are based on data from 2008 or later.

Topics

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United States in Detail

Housing

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Key Findings

In many OECD countries, home ownership is an important dimension of individual well-being. It protects owners from fluctuations in rents and ensures families a stable and secure shelter. Additionally, the value of a property represents a major source of wealth for households. Over 67% of occupied dwellings in the United States are inhabited by the owners themselves,  the same as the OECD-23 average.

In addition to measuring home ownership rates, it is also important to examine living conditions, such as the average number of rooms shared per person and whether households have access to basic facilities.

The number of rooms in a dwelling, divided by the number of persons living there, indicates whether residents are living in crowded conditions. Overcrowded housing may have a negative impact on physical and mental health, relations with others and the development of children. In addition, dense living conditions are often a sign of inadequate water and sewage supply. In the United States, the average home contains an estimated 2.3 rooms per person, much more than the OECD average of 1.6 rooms per person. In terms of basic facilities, nearly every dwelling in the United States contains private access to an indoor flushing toilet.

Data for rooms per person in the United States rely on OECD estimates. These figures will be updated as official information becomes available.

Indicators

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Income

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Key Findings

While money may not buy happiness, it is an important means to achieving higher living standards and thus greater well-being. Higher economic wealth may also improve access to quality education, healthcare and housing.

Household net-adjusted disposable income is the amount of money that a household earns each year after tax. It represents the money available to a household for spending on goods or services. In United States, the average household net-adjusted disposable income is 37 690 USD a year, higher than the OECD average of 22 284 USD.

Household financial wealth is the total value of a household’s financial worth. In United States, the average household wealth is estimated at 98 440 USD, much higher than the OECD average of 36 808 USD. While the ideal measure of household wealth should include real assets (e.g. land and dwellings), such information is currently available for only a small number of OECD countries.

Indicators

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Jobs

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Key Findings

Having a job brings many important benefits, including: providing a source of income, improving social inclusion, fulfilling one’s own aspirations, building self-esteem and developing skills and competencies. In the United States, nearly 67% of the working-age population aged 15 to 64 has a paid job. This figure is close to the OECD employment average of 65%.

Unemployed persons are defined as those who are not currently working but are willing to do so and actively searching for work. Long-term unemployment can have a large negative effect on feelings of well-being and self-worth and result in a loss of skills, further reducing employability. In the United States, the percentage of the labour force that has been unemployed for a year or longer is currently at 2.85%, slightly lower than the OECD average.

Indicators

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Community

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Key Findings

Humans are social creatures. The frequency of our contact with others and the quality of our personal relationships are thus crucial determinants of our well-being.

A strong social network, or community, can provide emotional support during both good and bad times as well as provide access to jobs, services and other material opportunities. In the United States, 92% of people believe that they know someone they could rely on in a time of need, slightly higher than the OECD average. Nearly 66% reported having helped a stranger in the last month, also higher than the OECD average.

A weak social network can result in limited economic opportunities, a lack of contact with others, and eventually, feelings of isolation. Socially isolated individuals face difficulties integrating into society as a contributing member and fulfilling personal aspirations. Nearly 3% of people in the United States reported ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ spending time with friends, colleagues or others in social settings; this figure is one of the lowest in the OECD.

Indicators

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Education

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Key Findings

A well-educated and well-trained population is essential for a country’s social and economic well-being. Education plays a key role in providing individuals with the knowledge, skills and competences needed to participate effectively in society and in the economy. Most concretely, having a good education greatly improves the likelihood of finding a job and earning enough money. Lifetime earnings also increase with each level of education.

Following a decline in manual labour over previous decades, employers now favour a more educated labour force. High-school graduation rates therefore provide a good indication of whether a country is preparing its students to meet the minimum requirements of the job market.

In the United States, 89% of adults aged 25-64 have earned the equivalent of a high-school degree, higher than the OECD average of 73%. Among younger people – a better indicator of the United States’ future – 88% of 25-34 year-olds have earned the equivalent of a high-school degree, also higher to the OECD average of 80%.

But graduation rates, while important, speak little to the quality of education received. The OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) reviews the extent to which students have acquired some of the knowledge and skills that are essential for full participation in modern societies. In 2009, PISA focused on examining students’ reading ability, as research shows that reading skills are more reliable predictors of economic and social well-being than the number of years spent in school.

The average student in the United States scored 500 out of 600 in reading literacy, slightly higher than the OECD average of 493. However, certain students performed well in science, with more than 9% reaching the two highest levels of proficiency.

Better Policies for Better Lives

Innovative teacher-preparation program in Boston

The Boston Teacher Residency (BTR), established in 2003, is a teacher-preparation program that recruits high-performing college graduates and professionals and prepares them to teach in Boston schools. The program focuses on mastering the skills that teachers will need to be effective in the public schools in which teachers will work, emphasizing clinical training and pairing residents with experienced classroom teachers.

Residents begin the program with a two-month summer institute, and then spend their first year in a classroom four days a week, spending the fifth day attending courses and seminars. This approach allows residents to simultaneously master both the theory and practice of teaching. After their first year, residents receive an initial teacher license and a master’s degree in education, and continue to receive support from BTR in the form of induction coaching, courses and seminars, and placement in collaborative clusters within schools.

A study of the program’s impact on student achievement is underway, but early indicators of success include a rigorous recruitment and selection process in which only 13% of applicants are admitted, three-year retention rates of 85% (far above the U.S. average for urban schools), growth of the program’s outputs to fill 60% of Boston’s annual need for math and science teachers, and highly favourable reviews from school principals, with 96% of principals saying they would recommend hiring a BTR graduate to another principal. BTR recently received a USD 5 million “development” grant under the U.S. Department of Education’s Investing in Innovation Fund, which seeks to identify and scale up promising and proven practices in teacher education and other priority areas.

Indicators

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Environment

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Key Findings

Outdoor air pollution is one important environmental issue that directly affects the quality of peoples’ lives. Air pollution in urban centres, often caused by transport and the use of small-scale burning of wood or coal, is linked to a range of health problems, from minor eye irritation to upper respiratory symptoms in the short-term and chronic respiratory diseases such as asthma, cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer in the long-term. Children and the elderly may be particularly vulnerable.

PM10 – tiny particulate matter small enough to be inhaled into the deepest part of the lung – is monitored in OECD countries because it can harm human health and reduce life expectancy. In the United States, PM10 levels are 19.4 micrograms per cubic meter, lower than the OECD average of 22 micrograms per cubic meter. On the whole, air quality has improved since the mid-1990s.

Indicators

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Governance

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Key Findings

A cohesive society is one where citizens have a high degree of confidence in their governmental institutions and public administration. 58% of people in the United States say they trust their political institutions, close to the OECD average of 56%. High voter turnout is another measure of public trust in government and of citizens' participation in the political process. In the most recent elections for which data is available, voter turnout in the United States was 90% of those registered. This figure is much higher than the OECD average of 72%.

Ensuring that government decision making is not compromised by conflicts of interest is key to maintaining trust in government. Transparency is therefore essential to hold government to account and to maintain confidence in public institutions.

Freedom of information laws (FOI) allows the possibility for individuals to access undisclosed information. For such policies to be successful, the public should have a clear understanding of their rights under the law, should be able to file requests with ease and should be protected against any possible retaliation. People in the United States can file a request for information either in writing or online – thus greatly facilitating the FOI process. There is even built-in protection from retaliation – an important protection that few OECD countries have adopted. There is not yet, however, a provision for anonymity.

Indicators

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Health

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Key Findings

Most OECD countries have enjoyed large gains in life expectancy over the past decades, thanks to improvements in living conditions, public health interventions and progress in medical care. While life expectancy in the United States used to be 1 ½ year above the OECD average in 1960, it is now, at 78 years in 2008, one year below the average of 79 years.

Higher life expectancy is generally associated with higher healthcare spending per person, although many other factors have an impact on life expectancy (such as living standards, lifestyles, education and environmental factors). Health spending accounted for 16% of GDP in the United States in 2008, by far the highest share in the OECD, and seven percentage points higher than the average of 9% in OECD countries. Following the United States were France, Switzerland and Germany, which allocated respectively 11.2%, 10.7% and 10.5% of their GDP to health.

The United States spent 7,538 USD on health per person in 2008, two-and-a-half times greater than the OECD average of 3,060 USD. Americans spent more than twice as much as relatively rich European countries such as France, Germany and the United Kingdom. The United States spends much more on health than any other OECD country on a per capita basis and as a share of GDP. This higher expenditure can only be partly explained by the high income level of US citizens. The extra $750bn that America spends on health more than expected is not due to greater ‘need’ due to aging or sickness, but instead to higher prices for medical goods and services.

Throughout the OECD, tobacco consumption and excessive weight gain remain two important risk factors for many chronic diseases.

In the United States, the proportion of adults who smoke daily has been cut by more than half over the past thirty years, falling from 33.5% in 1980 to 16.5% in 2008. This is the lowest rate among OECD countries after Sweden. Much of this decline can be attributed to policies aimed at reducing tobacco consumption through public awareness campaigns, advertising bans and increased taxation.

Soaring obesity rates make the US the fattest country in the OECD. Overweight and obesity rates have increased steadily since the 1980s in both men and women. In the United States, the obesity rate among adults - based on actual measures of height and weight - was 33.8% in 2008. This is the highest rate among OECD countries. Three out of four people are projected by the OECD to be overweight or obese within 10 years. 40% of American children are currently overweight. Of these, half are obese -- the highest rate in the OECD.

Childhood obesity rates have become relatively stable in the last ten years, suggesting that substantial further growth is unlikely and overweight rates in boys might even begin to fall. Still, obesity’s prevalence foreshadows increases in the occurrence of health problems (such as diabetes, cardiovascular diseases and asthma), and higher health care costs in the future.

When asked, "How is your health in general?", 88% of people in the United States reported to be in good health, much higher than the OECD average of 69%. Despite the subjective nature of this question, the answers have been found to be a good predictor of people’s future health care use.

Better Policies for Better Lives

Reduce inefficiencies in healthcare to reduce spending

In most countries, health spending is largely financed out of taxes or social security contributions, with private insurance or ‘out-of-pocket’ payments playing a significant but secondary role. This is not the case in the United States where the government plays the smallest role in financing health spending. The public share of health expenditure in the United States was 46.5% in 2008, much lower than the OECD average of 72.8%.

However, the level of health spending in the United States is so high that public (i.e. government) spending on health per person is greater than in all other OECD countries, excepting only Norway and Luxembourg. For this amount of public expenditure in the United States, government provides insurance coverage only for the elderly and disabled people (through Medicare) and some of the poor (through Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, SCHIP), whereas in most other OECD countries this is enough for government to provide universal primary health insurance. Public spending on health in the United States has been growing more rapidly than private spending since 1990, largely due to expansions in coverage.

Indicators

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Life Satisfaction

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Key Findings

Happiness can be measured in terms of life satisfaction, the presence of positive experiences and feelings, and the absence of negative experiences and feelings. Such measures, while subjective, are a useful complement to compare the quality of life across countries.

For the United States, like throughout much of the OECD, self-reported life satisfaction has been rising over the last decade. In recent polling, 70% were satisfied with their life and 80% believe that their life will be satisfying five years later.

76% of people in the United States reported having more positive experiences in an average day (feelings of rest, pride in accomplishment, enjoyment, etc) than negative ones (pain, worry, sadness, boredom, etc). This figure is higher than the OECD average of 72%.

Indicators

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Safety

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Key Findings

Personal security is a core element for the well-being of individuals, and largely reflects the risks of people being physically assaulted or falling victim to other types of crime. Across the OECD, victimisation rates for conventional crime (theft, robbery, assault) have declined in the new millennium. In the United States, 2% of people reported falling victim to assault over the previous 12 months, lower than the OECD average of 4%. 19% of people feel unsafe on the street after dark, also lower than the OECD average of 26%.

The homicide rate (the number of murders per 100,000 inhabitants) is a more reliable measure of a country’s safety level because, unlike other crimes, murders are usually always reported to the police. According to the latest OECD data, the United States’ homicide rate is 5.2, higher than the OECD average and one of the highest in the OECD.

Indicators

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Work-Life Balance

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Key Findings

Finding a suitable balance between work and life is a challenge for all workers, especially working parents. Some couples would like to have (more) children, but do not see how they could afford to stop working. Other parents are happy with the number of children in their family, but would like to work more. This is a challenge to governments because if parents cannot achieve their desired work/life balance, not only is their welfare lowered but so is development in the country.

In the United States, 73% of mothers are employed after their children begin school; this figure is higher than the OECD average of 66% and suggests that mothers are able to successfully balance family and career.

Another important aspect of work-life balance is the amount of time a person spends at work. Evidence suggests that long work hours may impair personal health, jeopardize safety and increase stress. People in the United States work 1768 hours a year, higher than the OECD average of 1739 hours.

The more people work, the less time they have to spend on other activities, such as time with others or leisure. The amount and quality of leisure time is important for people’s overall well-being, and can bring additional physical and mental health benefits. People in the United States devote 63% of their day, or 15.1 hours, to personal care (eating, sleeping, etc.) and leisure (socializing with friends and family, hobbies, games, computer and television use, etc.) – close to the OECD average.

Better Policies for Better Lives

Reducing poverty among working families

OECD analysis suggests that the US could help working families to reduce poverty rates by strengthening services and benefits for children in their early years, including legislating for paid parental leave, and building on the successes of child education and care services, such as the Headstart programme.

Families in the US understand the value of a good head start. In the US, total public spending on child welfare and education is USD 160 000 up to the age of 18, above the OECD average of USD 149 000. But the US leaves it late, spending the most money on public compulsory education. This means early investment – including childcare and support for families around the time of birth – could be strengthened.

The US, for example, is the only OECD country without a national paid parental leave policy, although some states do provide leave payments. Available parental leave is short (12 weeks), and only covers some employees (those in companies with 50+ workers). While making changes will involve a cost to employers, there will be benefits not only to child well-being but also the labour market, as evidence suggests that when US mothers take their full leave entitlement, they are more likely to return to work than mothers who do not.

Leave is short for a reason: US family well-being is strongly linked to employment because a significant proportion of public family support is delivered via tax breaks and credits (45% of total compared to 10% on average in the OECD). Nevertheless female employment in the US has been falling for the last decade, albeit from high levels. This fall is happening despite US women having better career prospects compared to most other OECD countries (35% of management jobs occupied by women) and lower career costs associated with child-rearing (where mothers earn over 80% of non-mothers’ earnings over a working life).

Indicators

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