The effectiveness of a country's leaders is best measured by examining the well-being of that country's citizens.Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement and explain your reasoning for the position

Nowadays, the well-being of country's citizens is measured solely by economic growth. Other values like freedom of speech and expression, equal opportunities, and security of citizens , however, greatly account for overall well-being of citizens. Unfortunately, many leaders of countries, although very effective, concentrated mostly on monetary values, leaving civil rights far behind. It is not effectiveness of a country's leaders itself that brings wealth to country's citizens, but effective work toward the citizen's needs that is crucial.

Firstly, let's take a closer look on effectiveness of nowadays' communist governments. Leaders of such countries are very effective, but their work is not directed toward people's benefits anymore. It is the working class that should rule the country. Governments that lacks plurality, however, most often become corrupted and in consequence forgot about wealth of its citizens. China , for instance, has a very high economic growth. Country's leaders, however, have no respect for peoples' rights. Many of Chinese people work extremely hard, and still cannot make ends meet.
Likewise, leaders in India take great care about economic growth, unfortunately at the expense of inequalities and discrimination of people.

Secondly, is there any objective measure to judge the well-being of country's citizens? Taking Belarus as an example, there is plenty of people that praise government actions, even though this actions are aimed against them, and they live in abject poverty. Some greatly influenced by mass media (that are in accord with rulers) would claim that they have everything they need and their desires are fulfilled.

Finally, taking USA as a country where civil rights are respected the most, correlation of economic growth and people well being seems to be reasonable to asses country's well being. When comparing well-being of country's citizens with another country, however, additional factors are necessary to be taken into account.

To recapitulate, well-being of country's citizens is a too complex to measure it directly via economic growth. Numerous examples indicate that even though citizens have their material needs satisfied, there still are other factors that greatly impact their perception of well-being. Overall, it is not only effectiveness of a country's leaders that matters, but also effective work answering people's needs to leave healthy and peacefully, that have to be taken into account for the citizens to feel satisfaction.