Key Economic and Welfare Indicators for Global Economies

GDP, Per Capita GDP, GDP growth rates etc may not always capture the welfare and standard of living of the people. GDP growth is dependent on a number of factors including global economic environment and natural calamities which are well beyond the control of any one country or group.

Even in the "rich" economies of the west, economic inequality is surprisingly high. In case of emerging market economies with high populations this contrast is even starker. The scope for re-distributive taxes is limited in case of emerging markets, they would not want to hurt their growth prospects.

For low and middle income group countries the transition to high income group may last several decades and growth (and development) may remain "top heavy" for a long time to come. As such these low or middle income economies will have to make the best of what they have by focusing on administrative/governance procedures and outcomes. The target must be to provide at least a minimum standard of living for the vast majority of the populace.

It becomes important to identify key economic and welfare indicators  -- measure and target these measures over a period of time. By publishing these measures from time to time governments can showcase their performances to all concerned stake holders. 

Ideally you would want welcome more number of third party, neutral and non-profit organizations to study different economies and provide unbiased opinions.

Let us take a look at the key economic indicators of some of the major economies of the world. Most of the data has been sourced from world bank website and may not reflect the most recent update.

1. GDP by Country and Economic Groups

2. GDP by country in PPP terms:

Exchange rates are not always the true indicator of what money can buy within a country. So GDP in Purchasing Power Parity terms uses a basket of goods and services to measure the exchange rate in terms of the purchasing power of money.

3. Population by Country


  

4. GDP Per Capita

5. Countries by benchmark interest rates set by central banks

Argentina has inflation of more than 40% and Turkey's inflation rate is around 13.6% per annum.


6. Countries by Inflation Rate(CPI)

 7. Unemployment Rate by Country

 8. Greenhouse Gas Emissions by Country

 

9. Infant Mortality Rate by Country

 

10. Maternal Mortality Rate


11. Corruption Perception Index by Transparency International

Starting from 1...1 is the best ranking.


12. Ease of Doing Business Ranking 

India has moved up 17 notches in 2020, India is at 63 out of 190 countries.

 So the idea is to identify and devise if necessary key performance and welfare indicators for different sectors or areas of the economy and track them on a continuous basis. The relationship between Keynesian spending and growth/employment is not one to one  -  so constant monitoring is required to ensure desired outcomes.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How Big Tech Firms have redefined the paradigms of economics!

Not a day passes by without using at least one product or application of the Big Tech companies.  These companies have redefined the long established principles of economics. 1. Networking Effects: Networking effects is the phenomenon where the value of a product increases due to the addition of every new customer/user. The effect of networking in tech industry implies that the company/product which is the 'early mover' has an advantage and the value of the network grows with every additional user. In 'network industries' the equilibrium tends towards a few products and their companies. Consider Microsoft, the predominant operating system of the world. Consumers want to stick to (Microsoft) technologies that are dominant and compatible with all the other users, software and hardware products. Once consumers get used to these applications or products they do not wish to change easily.  Similarly, with Facebook, any new user benefits due to the gigantic network of users a...
Read more

Restating the Neoclassical Theory of Factor Income Distribution

Image
 The Gini Coefficient measures the equality of incomes of the population in an economy. As shown in the image below the % cumulative population is marked on the x-axis and the corresponding cumulative incomes are marked on the y-axis. The red curve showing actual distribution of incomes is called Lorenzo curve and the distance between the line of equality and Lorenzo curve is measured by the Gini coefficient. A score closer to 0 indicates perfect equality whereas a score of 100 indicates perfect inequality. This is a list of 100+ countries sorted by Gini coefficient sourced from https://knoema.com/atlas/ranks/GINI-index It is not surprising for us to note that many of the developing countries are facing high degree of inequality whereas some of the Western European and Scandinavian countries have better income equality. The income inequality in United States is close to that of Uganda and Mongolia! The Neoclassical Theory The traditional neoclassical theory states that factor incom...
Read more

Budget Wishlist 2024

Here's my budget  wish list for 2024: 1 . Universal Basic Income(Support): The total work force of the United States is less than 17 crores using which they are able to generate a real GDP in excess of 20 trillion dollars(2022 wiki). The total workforce of Europe is under 20 crores(2022 wiki). Except for China which has a work force of 78 crores(2022 wiki), no other country has bigger workforce than India which has 55 crores. As per recent KLEMS database of RBI, the workforce number is 64.3 crores but many economists have questioned this number. With the onus on productivity we are moving towards a world in which investments are technology-intensive, definitely not labor intensive. Some economists have envisioned a world where machines take over the bulk of the work load with minimal human intervention. In India, the annual requirement for jobs is around 2 crores whereas job creation per annum is limited to 40 to 50 lakhs in spite of the best efforts of the incumbent government. T...
Read more