Haiti and the Dominican Republic: Contrasting Fortunes

Haiti is currently engulfed in the chaos caused by violent gang warfare, triggering a major wave of internal displacement. Almost 200,000 people are thought to have been displaced in 2023, and several thousand since the beginning of 2024. Thousands of Haitians continue to flee to the neighboring Dominican Republic, with the Haitian-Dominican border currently in a state of major crisis.

Relations between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, which share the island of Hispaniola, have long been complex. While the economies of the two countries were comparable in the mid-20th century, the Dominican economy gradually improved over the subsequent decades. The Republic of Haiti, long plagued by political instability, has seen its economy deteriorate.

While Haiti is currently the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, the situation is radically different in the Dominican Republic. Nearly 6 out of 10 Haitians (58.7 percent) live on less than $3.70 a day, while only 4% of Dominicans are in this state of poverty. GDP per capita is also almost six times higher in the Dominican Republic than in Haiti. These differences are also reflected in the life expectancy of each country - Haiti has an average life expectancy at birth of 63 years, while in the Dominican Republic it stands at 73 years.