The Youth Human Development Index

From September 2021 to April 2022, the Caixa Foundation Commissioned our group to write a report on youth development in Spain under the Project “The Future of the Future”. After revising all literature related to youth development in Spain, the SEE research team led by Dr. Flavio Comim, and composed of Octasiano Valerio Mendoza and Mihály Tamás Borsi, found that that there was a gap unexplored. Despite youth composite indicators such as those offered by the Centro Reina Sofía, the great majority of information provided by Spain’s public agencies in collaboration with research centers focuses either on dashboards or on a sectorial approach that do not provide an articulated picture of the youth in the country per regions (CC.AA.). It is true that the Centre Reina Sofia provides an index that it could fill this gap but we believe that an index of 26 dimensions that does not include the income earned by the youth does not satisfy the criterion of a human development index.
For this reason, we decided to propose a ‘Youth Human Development Index’ (YHDI) for Spain, covering 12 years. We used official government statistics. The YHDI consists of youth from three main components: a long and healthy life, access to education, and a decent standard of living. These dimensions are represented by subsequent indexes that describe them most accurately. The common aspect of all dimensions is their focus on youth living in Spain. They represent the population that is between 16 and 34 years old.
The YHDI Report will be used by the Caixa Foundation, local and national Government agencies to design and implement new policies to ameliorate youth precarity and disparities.