[rdtsc]

> It ranks 107th out of 180 on Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index, which is middling, but not especially bad, roughly comparable to Indonesia and Brazil.

I would still guess corruption is a major reason. Sometimes the way it’s measured and how it’s reported is not accurate. People internalize corrupt practices as normal and stop viewing it as corruption. A bribe is a gift, a nepotistic appointment is “taking care of one’s family”.

It also doesn’t always make sense to compare only corruption with other countries. Some may be more corrupt but they have enough positive factors that they develop better despite the corruption.

[marcosdumay]

The Tranparency International's index is a horrible measure.

It's more dependent on the press reporting corruption than of any other factor, for the extent that it measures anything real it focuses exclusively on small scale corruption, and it incredibly biased by cultural factors.

It's a mistake to use it to compare one country with another, and it's a mistake to use it to spot trends in a single place. AFAIK, it's a mistake to use it.

[MichaelZuo]

Does anyone even give them credibility in the first place…?

Such an exceedingly complex thing just seems improbable to take at face value, without an enormous amount of proof and well reasoned methodology backing it up.

[marcosdumay]

I've never seen a press outlet that didn't give them credibility.

A few times they notice that fighting against corruption is known to increase the index at a footnote somewhere. But that's rare.

[MichaelZuo]

I meant on HN, who takes mass media output at face value about anything that complex?

[nradov]

It is notoriously difficult to gather accurate quantitative data on illegal or unethical activities. And the weightings in the index are rather arbitrary.

[dudeinjapan]

So corrupt even the reporting of corruption is corrupt?

[rdtsc]

That’s also a possibility. I was mainly thinking where it’s so embedded it’s not even perceived as corruption anymore.

But yeah, what you’re saying is also done. Usually something like an anti-corruption ministry is created. Their job is to find and prosecute corruption. Guess what the most “lucrative “ and cushiest jobs are now - that’s right, the anti corruption ministry itself. Anyone doing business now has to bribe them too in addition to whoever they bribed before. And corruption goes “down” officially, and it looks good on international external metrics.

[bluGill]

Countries trying to become uncorrupt generally go way down because they can start reporting on found corruption. This means people care and so it is worth reporting.