percápita

Percápita, often rendered as per capita in English, is a statistical measure that expresses a total amount divided by the number of people in a given population, yielding an average amount per person. It is used to compare economic output, income, or resource use across regions or over time while accounting for population size. The standard calculation is value divided by population, with the denominator drawn from the period’s average population or a census figure.

Common applications include GDP per capita, income per capita, consumption per capita, and energy use per capita. These indicators help assess living standards, productivity, or demand in a way that facilitates cross-country or cross-region comparisons. Per-capita measures can be reported in nominal terms (current prices) or, to aid comparisons, in real terms or purchasing power parity (PPP) terms.

Limitations include the fact that per-capita figures do not reveal the distribution of a resource or outcome within a population. Two regions with the same per-capita GDP can have markedly different income inequality, household sizes, or age structures. Per-capita measures can also be sensitive to population data quality and demographic changes, such as migration or aging.

Related concepts include median income, the Gini coefficient, and other per-capita variants across domains (e.g., energy per capita). An example: if a country has a GDP of 1 trillion USD and a population of 50 million, GDP per capita equals 20,000 USD.