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One important way that rich countries affect poorer ones over the long run is through technology. The Internet, mobile phones, vaccines, and high-yielding grains were all invented by rich-country researchers and exported to poorer ones, where they improved—and saved—many lives. For example, with medical technology from rich countries, human health and survival in Latin America and East Asia made gains over four decades during the 20th century that took Europe almost 150 years. Of course, new technologies do harm as well as good: consider the motor vehicle, which symbolizes gridlock and pollution more than freedom in dense and growing cities such as Bangkok.

The CDI rewards polices that support the creation and dissemination of innovations of value to developing countries. It rewards government subsidies for research and development (R&D), whether delivered through spending or tax breaks, while discounting military R&D by half. On the one hand, much military R&D does more to improve the destructive capacity of rich countries than the productive capacity of poor ones. On the other, military security is important for development, and military R&D can have civilian spin-offs. Consider that the Pentagon partly funded the early development of the Internet.

Also factored in are policies on intellectual property rights (IPRs) that can inhibit the international flow of innovations. These take the form of patent laws that arguably go too far in advancing the interests of those who produce innovations at the expense of those who use them. U.S. trade negotiators, for example, have pushed for developing countries to agree never to force the immediate licensing of a patent even when it would serve a compelling public interest, as an HIV/AIDS drug might if produced by low-cost local manufacturers.

Portugal, South Korea and Denmark finish at the top of the technology component, thanks to government expenditure on R&D worth around 1 percent of their GDPs (despite South Korea devoting much of this to defense). France and Spain give the highest tax subsidy rates to businesses but spend less overall on R&D as a share of GDP. The United States and many European countries lose points for promoting compulsory licensing bans and pushing for the incorporation of “TRIPS-Plus” measures—which restrict the flow of innovations to developing countries—into bilateral free trade agreements.

For more on technology, explore the Making Markets for Vaccines initiative and related experts.