Earth is so ghetto, we decided to score and rank it. Hover any country to see receipts on air pollution, billionaires, political polarization, incarceration, housing affordability, healthcare out-of-pocket costs, life expectancy and homicide. This isn't about poor countries. It's about powerful ones failing on purpose.
Top of the leaderboard means most cooked by its own choices, not poorest. Wealth without responsibility scores worse than poverty.
Wealthy countries that scored higher than your gut said they would.
We made a map. These people did the hard part. Latest headlines pulled live from investigative outlets worth your eyeballs — and when you can spare it, your money.
The Cooked Index is a weighted blend of eight metrics chosen to highlight failures of power: air pollution, billionaire count, political polarization, incarceration, housing affordability, healthcare out-of-pocket spending, life expectancy, and the homicide rate. Sources include Forbes, IQAir, V-Dem, World Prison Brief, Numbeo, WHO, UN/WPP and UNODC.
Read the full methodology →Hosting is cheap, keeping the index current is not. If this made you laugh-cry, kick in a few bucks. Or skip us entirely and donate to one of the outlets in the Receipts section. They need it more.
Buy us a coffee ☕Think we missed something obvious? Got a country we should add? Found a better data source? Drop it here. We read every one and the good ones make the next update.