ELL (The Equivalent Length of Life); or, Another Attempt at Measuring Development

The pursuit of an adequate measure of development which would easily allow international comparisons has certainly been one of the main research interests of development specialists in the past ten years. Numerous proposals have been made but there seems to be quite a large consensus on the two minimal conditions that an ideal development index should fulfill: firstly, it should measure results and not inputs; secondly, it should be sensitive to the distribution of the benefits of development among the population.