Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI)

by

Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI)

Physical Quality of Life Index (P.Q.L.I) was developed by famous economist Morris David in 1979 for 23 developed and developing countries. Morris David used the following three indicators to prepare a composite index known as Physical Quality of Life Index:

  • Life Expectant Rate (L.E.I)
  • Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)
  • Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)

Life Expectant Rate (L.E.I)

Life expectancy means average number of year a person is expected to live. As per census of 2011, it is 66.8 years in India.

Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)

It refers to the number of infants dying within one year of their birth out of every 1000 births. As per census report of 2011, it is 47 per 1000. Higher infant mortality is harmful for economic development.

Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)

Any person above the age of 7 year who can read and write in any one language with an ability to understand it is considered as literate. As per census 2011, it is 74.04% in India.

For each of the above indicator, the performance of individual country is rated on a scale of 1 to 100 where 1 represents the worst performance and 100 represent the best performance. P.Q.L.I is then constructed by averaging these three indicators giving equal weight to each of them.

Morris David has given following formula to obtain P.Q.L.I

P.Q.L.I = L.E.I.+ I.M.I.+ B.L.I. / 3

Advantage of P.Q.L.I

  • Q.L.I helps to government to understand the overall welfare in the economy and how well its welfare policies are being implemented. This helps the government to take corrective action.
  • The method followed to measure P.Q.L.I is standard for all the countries. Therefore, it can be used to make comparison between countries and this helps the relatively underdeveloped countries to take corrective measure.
  • The three indicator i.e. life expectancy rate, infant mortality rate and literacy rate very well represent the welfare of the people of the country. A country wherein all the three indicators are good can be said to be a developed economy.
  • The P.Q.L.I considers the distribution of welfare in the country. A country cannot have a high average of literacy rate, life expectancy and low infant mortality rate unless a large part of the population is covered by the benefits of economic development.

Limitations of P.Q.L.I.

  • Q.L.I ignores many factors which influence the quality of life such as employment, housing, justice, social security as well as human rights.
  • Q.L.I is a simple average of literacy rate, infant mortality rate and life expectancy rate i.e. all the factors have been giving equal weightage. However, it is difficult to understand the rationale behind giving equal importance to all factors.
  • Q.L.I. does not explain the structural change in the economy of a country. Moreover, it does not at all consider economic or monetary concept. Hence, it is a poor measure of economic development as well as economic growth.

Inspite of these drawbacks, P.Q.L.I. is considered as an improvement over traditional measure of economic welfare. However, recently developed Human Development Index (HDI) is a better and more refined version of PQLI.

[/lockercat]HPPCS Notes brings Prelims and Mains programs for HPPCS Prelims and HPPCS Mains Exam preparation. Various Programs initiated by HPPCS Notes are as follows:- For any doubt, Just leave us a Chat or Fill us a querry––