a way wealthier Mexico as a primary trade partner
True. I was thinking of Quebec and the CSA (which is hinted to be even poorer than Quebec in some of the EU stuff) and not really remembering that Mexico isn't a basket-case here. A Mexico as wealthy relative to the USA as Canada would be a powerhouse for bilateral trade and increased cross-border manufacturing specialization of the sort which exists around the Great Lakes IOTL.
So youd probably have a higher HDI and lower GINI number, even with a GDP per capita in the mid to low 60,000s by 2022-23ish rather than the high 70ks
Hmm.
So my thinking on this is likely to be somewhat poorly received by the prevailing political currents on this site, but here goes:
1. HDI is, to a very close approximation, a metric which determines how close a country is to a Nordic Social Democratic ideal. It's not a terrible measure of human flourishing but I don't really think it's the be-all and end-all either.
2. That said, GDP is an accounting measure; US GDP is higher than Western European
in part because we more directly account for expenses in the healthcare and higher education sectors, each of which is laden with more rent-seeking than in Western Europe.
3. But that still only accounts for, at most, a third or so of the gap in GDP per capita between the US and Germany or the Netherlands, let alone between the US and France or the UK.
4. The size of our internal market, depth and liquidity of our capital markets, breadth of domestic energy resources, friendliness to immigration, and the fact that our regulatory regime is more favorable to business formation, bankruptcy, investment, R&D, and commercialization of technology explains the remainder (which is the genuine gap in standard of living as opposed to accounting differences). Europe's labor, capital, and technology markets are grossly over-regulated, in stupid ways to boot.
5. The several sectors which Europe does *not* overregulate the hell out of, most importantly the construction of public infrastructure and for-profit private housing development, routinely outperform the US, where they're a massive drag on growth.
All this is to say that while TTL's America is likely to be a bit less unequal, I doubt the median standard of living is going to be better. Not with a smaller market, several poorer neighbors, and an economic model which is described as both more regulated and more corrupt than IOTL.