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Economy of the world From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The world economy or global economy is the economy of all humans in the world, referring to the global economic system, which includes all economic activities conducted both within and between nations, including production, consumption, economic management, work in general, financial transactions and trade of goods and services.[1][2] In some contexts, the two terms are distinct: the "international" or "global economy" is measured separately and distinguished from national economies, while the "world economy" is simply an aggregate of the separate countries' measurements. Beyond the minimum standard concerning value in production, use and exchange, the definitions, representations, models and valuations of the world economy vary widely. It is inseparable from the geography and ecology of planet Earth.
It is common to limit questions of the world economy exclusively to human economic activity, and the world economy is typically judged in monetary terms, even in cases in which there is no efficient market to help valuate certain goods or services, or in cases in which a lack of independent research, genuine data or government cooperation makes calculating figures difficult. Typical examples are illegal drugs and other black market goods, which by any standard are a part of the world economy, but for which there is, by definition, no legal market of any kind.
However, even in cases in which there is a clear and efficient market to establish monetary value, economists do not typically use the current or official exchange rate to translate the monetary units of this market into a single unit for the world economy since exchange rates typically do not closely reflect worldwide value – for example, in cases where the volume or price of transactions is closely regulated by the government.
Rather, market valuations in a local currency are typically translated to a single monetary unit using the idea of purchasing power. This is the method used below, which is used for estimating worldwide economic activity in terms of real United States dollars or euros. However, the world economy can be evaluated and expressed in many more ways. It is unclear, for example, how many of the world's 7.8 billion people (as of March 2020[update])[3][4] have most of their economic activity reflected in these valuations.
According to Maddison[who?], until the middle of the 19th century, global output was dominated by China and India with Indian subcontinent being the world's largest economy from 1 C.E to 17 C.E. Waves of the Industrial Revolution in Western Europe and Northern America shifted the shares to the Western Hemisphere. As of 2024, the following 20 countries or collectives have reached an economy of at least US$2 trillion by GDP in nominal or PPP terms: Brazil, Canada, China, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, the European Union and the African Union.[5][6]
Despite high levels of government investment, the global economy decreased by 3.4% in 2020 in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic,[7] an improvement from the World Bank's initial prediction of a 5.2 percent decrease.[8] Cities account for 80% of global GDP, thus they faced the brunt of this decline.[9][10] The world economy increased again in 2021 with an estimated 5.5 percent rebound.[11]
| Country group | List of country groups by GDP (nominal) in 2024 (or at peaked level) |
List of country groups by GDP (PPP) in 2024 (or at peaked level) |
Number of countries |
Major economies | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Value (in millions of US$) | Share of Global GDP | Value (in millions of US$) | Share of Global GDP | |||
| Major advanced economies (G7) (Continents: Europe, North America and Asia) |
49,300,856 | 44.8% | 56,578,926 | 29.1% | 7 |  United States Japan Germany France United Kingdom Italy Canada |
| Emerging and developing Asia (Continents: Asia and Oceania) |
26,276,864 | 23.9% | 66,794,352 | 34.3% | 30 |  China India Indonesia Thailand Bangladesh Vietnam Malaysia Philippines |
| Other advanced economies (advanced economies excluding the G7) (Continents: Europe, Asia, Oceania and North America) |
15,380,853 | 14.0% | 21,576,541 | 11.1% | 34 |  South Korea Spain Australia Taiwan Netherlands Switzerland Singapore Belgium Sweden Ireland Norway Austria |
| Latin America and the Caribbean (Continents: South America and North America) |
6,728,466 | 6.1% | 14,071,686 | 7.2% | 33 |  Brazil Mexico Argentina Colombia |
| Emerging and developing Europe (Continents: Europe and Asia) |
5,556,849 | 5.0% | 15,265,793 | 7.9% | 15 |  Russia Turkey Poland Romania Ukraine |
| Middle East and Central Asia (Continents: Asia and Africa) |
4,980,028 | 4.5% | 14,033,577 | 7.2% | 32 |  Egypt Saudi Arabia Iran Pakistan United Arab Emirates Kazakhstan Algeria |
| Sub-Saharan Africa (Continent: Africa) |
1,840,998 (peaked at 2,034,706 in 2022) |
1.7% | 6,247,651 | 3.2% | 45 |  Nigeria South Africa |
| World | 110,064,915 | 100.0% | 194,568,527 | 100.0% | 196 | |
| GDP sector composition (2019 estimate)[12][13] | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| The 25 largest economies by GDP (nominal), the 25 largest economies by GDP (PPP), 28 economies with the highest peak GDP per capita (nominal) and the 28 economies with the highest peak GDP per capita (PPP) as of 2024. Members of the G-20 major economies are in bold. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| List of the 25 largest economies by GDP (nominal) at their peak level as of 2024 in million US$[5] |
List of the 25 largest economies by GDP (PPP) at their peak level as of 2024 in million Int$[5] |
List of the 28 economies by highest GDP (nominal) per capita at their peak level as of 2024 in US$[14] |
List of the 28 economies by highest GDP (PPP) per capita at their peak level as of 2024 in Int$[15] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 | This section needs to be updated. (September 2020) |
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>$60,000
$50,000 – $60,000
$40,000 – $50,000
$30,000 – $40,000 |
$20,000 – $30,000
$10,000 – $20,000
$5,000 – $10,000
$2,500 – $5,000 |
$1,000 – $2,500
<$1,000
No data |
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Telephones – main lines in use: 843,923,500 (2007)
4,263,367,600 (2008)
Transportation infrastructure worldwide includes:
The Royal Society in a 2011 report stated that in terms of number of papers the share of English-language scientific research papers the United States was first followed by China, the UK, Germany, Japan, France, and Canada.[37] In 2015, research and development constituted an average 2.2% of the global GDP according to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics.[38] Metrics and rankings of innovation include the Bloomberg Innovation Index, the Global Innovation Index and the share of Nobel laureates per capita.
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From the scientific perspective, economic activities are embedded in a web of dynamic, interrelated, and interdependent activities that constitute the natural system of Earth. Novel application of cybernetics in decision-making (such as in decision-making related to process- and product-design and related laws) and direction of human activity (such as economic activity) may make it easier to control modern ecological problems.[57]
| Estimations of world population and GDP from a 2020 research paper[59] | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Year | Population (million) |
GDP per capita ($1990 in PPP) |
GDP in billion ($1990 in PPP) |
| 1000000 BCE | 0.125 | 400 | 0.05 |
| 300000 BCE | 1 | 400 | 0.40 |
| 25000 BCE | 3.34 | 400 | 1.34 |
| 10000 BCE | 4 | 400 | 1.60 |
| 5000 BCE | 5 | 404 | 2.02 |
| 4000 BCE | 7 | 409 | 2.87 |
| 3000 BCE | 14 | 421 | 5.90 |
| 2000 BCE | 27 | 433 | 11.7 |
| 1000 BCE | 50 | 444 | 22.2 |
| 500 BCE | 100 | 457 | 45.7 |
| 200 BCE | 150 | 465 | 69.7 |
| 1 | 168 | 467 | 78.4 |
| 200 | 190 | 463 | 88.0 |
| 400 | 190 | 463 | 88.0 |
| 500 | 190 | 463 | 88.0 |
| 600 | 200 | 462 | 92.3 |
| 700 | 210 | 460 | 96.6 |
| 800 | 220 | 459 | 101 |
| 900 | 240 | 456 | 109 |
| 1000 | 265 | 453 | 120 |
| 1100 | 320 | 512 | 164 |
| 1200 | 360 | 551 | 198 |
| 1300 | 360 | 551 | 198 |
| 1400 | 350 | 541 | 190 |
| 1500 | 438 | 625 | 274 |
| 1600 | 556 | 629 | 350 |
| 1700 | 603 | 658 | 397 |
| 1820 | 1,042 | 712 | 741 |
| 1870 | 1,276 | 884 | 1,128 |
| 1900 | 1,563 | ||
| 1913 | 1,793 | 1,543 | 2,767 |
| 1920 | 1,863 | ||
| 1940 | 2,299 | 2,181 | 5,013 |
| 1950 | 2,528 | 2,104 | 5,318 |
| 1960 | 3,042 | 2,764 | 12,170 |
| 1970 | 3,691 | 3,725 | 13,751 |
| 1980 | 4,440 | 4,511 | 20,026 |
| 1990 | 5,269 | 5,149 | 27,133 |
| 2000 | 6,077 | 6,057 | 36,806 |
| 2010 | 6,873 | 7,814 | 53,704 |
| 2019 | 7,620 | 9,663 | 73,640 |
One example for a comparable metric other than GDP are the OECD Better Life Index rankings for different aggregative domains.
| Legend | |||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Explained by: Housing
Explained by: Income
Explained by: Jobs |
Explained by: Community
Explained by: Education
Explained by: Environment |
Explained by: Civic engagement
Explained by: Health
Explained by: Life Satisfaction |
Explained by: Safety
Explained by: Work-Life Balance |
| OECD Better Life Index rankings for 2016 | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Overall Rank [60] |
Country | Housing | Income | Jobs | Community | Education | Environment | Civic engagement | Health | Life Satisfaction | Safety | Work-Life Balance |
| 1 | Norway |
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| 2 | Australia |
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| 3 |  Denmark |
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| 4 | Switzerland |
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| 5 | Canada |
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| 6 | Sweden |
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| 7 |  New Zealand |
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| 8 |  Finland |
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| 9 | United States |
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| 10 |  Iceland |
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| 11 | Netherlands |
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| 12 | Germany |
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| 13 |  Luxembourg |
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| 14 | Belgium |
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| 15 | Austria |
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| 16 | United Kingdom |
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| 17 | Ireland |
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| 18 | France |
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| 19 | Spain |
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| 20 |  Slovenia |
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| 21 |  Czech Republic |
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| 22 |  Estonia |
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| 23 | Japan |
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| 24 |  Slovakia |
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| 25 | Italy |
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| 26 |  Israel |
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| 27 | Poland |
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| 28 | South Korea |
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| 29 |  Portugal |
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| 30 |  Latvia |
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| 31 |  Greece |
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| 32 |  Hungary |
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| 33 | Russia |
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| 34 |  Chile |
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| 35 | Brazil |
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| 36 | Turkey |
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| 37 | Mexico |
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| 38 | South Africa |
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The index includes 11 comparable "dimensions" of well-being:[61]
To promote exports, many government agencies publish on the web economic studies by sector and country. Among these agencies include the USCS (US DoC) and FAS (USDA) in the United States, the EDC and AAFC in Canada, Ubifrance in France, the UKTI in the United Kingdom, the HKTDC and JETRO in Asia, Austrade and the NZTE in Oceania. Through Partnership Agreements, the Federation of International Trade Associations publishes studies from several of these agencies (USCS, FAS, AAFC, UKTI, and HKTDC) as well as other non-governmental organizations on its website globaltrade.net.
Regional economies:
Events:
Lists:
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