Top 10 Richest Country In The World
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1. United States of America - $15.065 Trillion!!
- Continent: North America
- Capital city: Washington D.C.
- Population: 313,042,000
- GDP per capita: $48,147
- Land Area: 9,826,675 km2
- Official languages: English
- Currency: USD (U.S. Dollar – $)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
According to the United States Census Bureau, the pretax median household income in 2010 was $49,445. The median ranged from $64,308 among Asian American households to $32,068 among African American households. Using purchasing power parity exchange rates, the overall median is similar to the most affluent cluster of developed nations. After declining sharply during the middle of the 20th century, poverty rates have plateaued since the early 1970s, with 11–15% of Americans below the poverty line every year, and 58.5% spending at least one year in poverty between the ages of 25 and 75. In 2010, 46.2 million Americans lived in poverty, a figure that rose for the fourth year in a row.
The U.S. welfare state is one of the least extensive in the developed world, reducing both relative poverty and absolute poverty by considerably less than the mean for rich nations, though combined private and public social expenditures per capita are relatively high.While the American welfare state effectively reduces poverty among the elderly, it provides relatively little assistance to the young.A 2007 UNICEF study of children's well-being in twenty-one industrialized nations ranked the United States next to last.
Between 1947 and 1979, real median income rose by over 80% for all classes, with the incomes of poor Americans rising faster than those of the rich.However, income gains since then have been slower, less widely shared, and accompanied by increased economic insecurity.Median household income has increased for all classes since 1980,largely owing to more dual-earner households, the closing of the gender gap, and longer work hours, but the growth has been strongly tilted toward the very top.Consequently, the share of income of the top 1%—21.8% of total reported income in 2005—has more than doubled since 1980, leaving the United States with the greatest income inequality among developed nations. The top 1% pays 27.6% of all federal taxes, while the top 10% pays 54.7%.Wealth, like income, is highly concentrated: The richest 10% of the adult population possesses 69.8% of the country's household wealth, the second-highest share among developed nations.The top 1% possesses 33.4% of net wealth In 2010 the United Nations Development Programme ranked the United States 12th among 139 countries on its inequality-adjusted human development index (IHDI), eight places lower than in the standard HDI.
2. China - $6.988 Trillion!
- Continent: Asia
- Capital city: Beijing
- Population: 1,339,724,852
- GDP per capita: $5,184
- Land Area: 9,640,821 km2
- Official languages: Modern Standard Mandarin
- Currency: CNY (Renminbi Yuan)
- From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia :
From its founding in 1949 until late 1978, the People's Republic of China was a Soviet-style centrally planned economy, without private businesses or capitalism. To propel the country towards a modern, industrialized communist society, Mao Zedong instituted the Great Leap Forward in the early 1960s, although this had decidedly mixed economic results. Following Mao's death in 1976 and the consequent end of the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping and the new Chinese leadership began to reform the economy and move towards a more market-oriented mixed economy under one-party rule. Collectivization of the agriculture was dismantled and farmlands were privatized to increase productivity. In 1978, the PRC normalized diplomatic relations with Japan began, which became a significant foreign donor. Modern-day China is mainly characterised as having a market economy based on private property ownership, and is one of the leading examples of state capitalism.
Under the post-Mao market reforms, a wide variety of small-scale private enterprises were encouraged, while the government relaxed price controls and promoted foreign investment. Foreign trade was focused upon as a major vehicle of growth, leading to the creation of Special Economic Zones (SEZs), first in Shenzhen and then in other Chinese cities. Inefficient state-owned enterprises(SOEs) were restructured by introducing western-style management systems, with unprofitable ones being closed outright, resulting in massive job losses. By the latter part of 2010, China was reversing some of its economic liberalization initiatives, with state-owned companies buying up independent businesses in the steel, auto and energy industries.
Since economic liberalization began in 1978, China's investment- and export-ledeconomy has grown almost a hundredfoldand is the fastest-growing major economy in the world. According to the IMF, China's annual average GDP growth between 2001 and 2010 was 10.5%, and the Chinese economy is predicted to grow at an average annual rate of 9.5% between 2011 and 2015. Between 2007 and 2011, China's economic growth rate was equivalent to all of the G7 countries' growth combined. According to theGlobal Growth Generators index announced by Citigroup in February 2011, China has a very high 3G growth rating.
As of 2012, China has the world's second-largest nominal GDP, totalling approximately 47.2 trillion yuan (US$7.47 trillion) according to the country's National Bureau of Statistics. However, China's 2011 nominal GDP per capita of US$5,184 puts it behind around ninety countries (out of 183 countries on the IMF list) in global GDP per capita rankings.If PPP is taken into account in GDP figures, China is again second only to the United States – in 2011, its PPP GDP reached $11.316 trillion, corresponding to $8,394 per capita.In 2009, China's primary, secondary, and tertiary industries contributed 10.6%, 46.8%, and 42.6% respectively to its total GDP.
China is the third-most-visited country in the world, with 55.7 million inbound international visitors in 2010. It is a member of the WTO and is the world's second-largest trading power behind the US, with a total international trade value of US$2.97 trillion–1.58 trillion in exports (#1) and US$1.39 trillion in imports (#2). Its foreign exchange reserves had reached US$2.85 trillion by the end of 2010, an increase of 18.7% over the previous year, making its reserves by far the world's largest. China owns an estimated $1.6 trillion of US securities. China, holding US$1.16 trillion in US Treasury bonds, is the largest foreign holder of US public debt.China is the world's third-largest recipient of inward FDI, attracting US$92.4 billion in 2008 alone, and China increasingly invests abroad, with a total outward FDI of US$52.2 billion in 2008 making it the world's sixth-largest outward investor. In 2010, China's inward FDI was $106 billion, marking a 16% increase over 2009.
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| A graph comparing the 2011 GDPs of major economies, according to IMF data. |
China's success has been primarily due to manufacturing as a low-cost producer. This is attributed to a combination of cheap labor, good infrastructure, relatively high productivity, favorable government policy, and a possibly undervalued exchange rate. The latter has been sometimes blamed for China's huge trade surplus (US$262.7 billion in 2007) and has become a major source of dispute between China and its major trading partners—the US, EU, and Japan—despite the yuan having been de-pegged and having risen in value by 20% against the US dollar since 2005.China is moreover widely criticised for manufacturing large quantities ofcounterfeit goods – in 2005, the Asia Business Council alleged that the counterfeiting industry accounted for 8% of China's GDP at the time.
The state still dominates in strategic "pillar" industries (such as energy and heavy industries), but private enterprise (composed of around 30 million private businesses)has expanded enormously; in 2005, it accounted for anywhere between 33% to 70%of national GDP, while the OECD estimate for that year was over 50% of China's national output, up from 1% in 1978. Its stock market in Shanghai, the SSE, has raised record amounts of IPOs and its benchmark Shanghai Composite indexhas doubled since 2005. SSE's market capitalization reached US$3 trillion in 2007, making it the world's fifth-largest stock exchange.
China now ranks 29th in the Global Competitiveness Index,although it is only ranked 135th among the 179 countries measured in the Index of Economic Freedom. 46 Chinese companies made the list in the 2010 Fortune Global 500 (Beijing alone with 30).Measured using market capitalization, four of the world's top ten most valuable companies are Chinese. Some of these include first-ranked PetroChina, third-ranked Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (the world's most valuable bank), fifth-ranked China Mobile (the world's most valuable telecommunicationscompany) and seventh-ranked China Construction Bank.
Although a middle-income country by Western standards, China's rapid growth has pulled hundreds of millions of its people out of poverty since 1978. Today, about 10% of the Chinese population live below the poverty line of US$1 per day (down from 64% in 1978), while life expectancy has increased to 73 years. More than 93% of the population is literate, compared to only 20% in 1950.Urban unemployment in China reportedly declined to 4% by the end of 2007, although true overall unemployment may be as high as 10%.
China's middle-class population (defined as those with annual income of at least US$17,000) has reached more than 100 million as of 2011, while the number of super-rich individuals worth more than 10 million yuan (US$1.5 million) is estimated to be 825,000, according to Hurun Report.[231] Based on the Hurun rich list, the number of US dollar billionaires in China doubled from 130 in 2009 to 271 in 2010, giving China the world's second-highest number of billionaires.China's retail market was worth RMB 8.9 trillion (US$1.302 trillion) in 2007, and is growing at 16.8% annually. China is also now the world's second-largest consumer of luxury goods behind Japan, with 27.5% of the global share.
China's growth has been uneven, with some geographic regions growing faster than others, and a pronounced urban-rural income gap contributing to a national Gini coefficient of 46.9%. Development has been mainly concentrated in the heavily urbanised eastern coastal regions, while the remainder of the country has lagged behind. To counter this, the government has promoted development in the western, northeastern, and central regions of China.
In recent years, China's rapid economic growth has contributed to severe consumer inflation, causing the prices of basic goods to rise steeply. Food prices in China increased by over 21% in the first four months of 2008 alone. To curb inflation and moderate rising property prices, the Chinese government has instituted a number of fiscal regulations and amendments, raising interest rates and imposing limits on bank loans. In September 2011, consumer prices rose by 6.1% compared to a year earlier, marking a reduction in inflation from the peak of 6.5% in July 2011. A side-effect of increased economic regulation was a slowdown in overall growth – China's quarterly GDP growth fell to 9.1% in October 2011, down from 9.5% in the previous quarter.
The Chinese economy is highly energy-intensive and inefficient—on average, industrial processes in China use 20%–100% more energy than similar ones in OECD countries. China became the world's largest energy consumer in 2010,but still relies on coal to supply about 70% of its energy needs.[240] Coupled with lax environmental regulations, this has led to massive water and air pollution, leaving China with 20 of the world's 30 most polluted cities.Consequently, the government has promised to use more renewable energy, planning to make renewables constitute 30% of China's total energy production by 2050. In 2010, China became the largest wind energy provider in the world, with a total installed wind power capacity of 41.8 GW. In January 2011, Russiabegan scheduled oil shipments to China, pumping 300,000 barrels of oil per day via the Eastern Siberia – Pacific Ocean oil pipeline.
3. Japan - $5.855 Trillion
- Continent: Asia
- Capital city: Tokyo
- Population: 127,960,000
- GDP per capita: $45,774
- Land Area: 377,944 km2
- Official languages: Japanese
- Currency: JPY (Japanese Yen - ¥)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Some of the structural features for Japan's economic growth developed in the Edo period, such as the network of transport routes, by road and water, and the futures contracts, banking and insurance of theOsaka rice brokers. During the Meiji period from 1868 Many of today's enterprises were founded at the time, and Japan emerged as the most developed nation in Asia. The period of overall real economic growth from the 1960s to the 1980s has been called the Japanese post-war economic miracle: it averaged 7.5 percent in the 1960s and 1970s, and 3.2 percent in the 1980s and early 1990s. Growth slowed markedly in the 1990s during what the Japanese call the Lost Decade, largely because of the after-effects of the Japanese asset price bubble and domestic policies intended to wring speculative excesses from the stock and real estate markets. Government efforts to revive economic growth met with little success and were further hampered by the global slowdown in 2000. The economy showed strong signs of recovery after 2005; GDP growth for that year was 2.8 percent, surpassing the growth rates of the US and European Unionduring the same period.
As of 2011, Japan is the third largest national economy in the world, after the United States and China, in terms of nominal GDP, and the fourth largest national economy in the world, after the United States, China and India in terms of purchasing power parity. As of January 2011, Japan's public debt was more than 200 percent of its annual gross domestic product, the largest of any nation in the world. In August 2011, Moody's rating has cut Japan's long-term sovereign debt rating one notch from Aa3 to Aa2 inline with the size of the country's deficit and borrowing level. The large budget deficits and government debt since the 2009 global recession and followed by earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 made the rating downgrade.The service sector accounts for three quarters of the gross domestic product. Japan has a large industrial capacity, and is home to some of the largest and most technologically advanced producers of motor vehicles, electronics, machine tools, steel and nonferrous metals, ships, chemical substances, textiles, and processed foods. Agricultural businesses in Japan cultivate 13 percent of Japan's land, and Japan accounts for nearly 15 percent of the global fish catch, second only to China. As of 2010, Japan's labor force consisted of some 65.9 million workers.Japan has a low unemployment rate of around four percent. Almost one in six Japanese, or 20 million people, lived in poverty in 2007.Housing in Japan is characterized by limited land supply in urban areas.
Japan's exports amounted to US$4,210 per capita in 2005. Japan's main export markets are China (18.88 percent), the United States (16.42 percent), South Korea (8.13 percent), Taiwan (6.27 percent) and Hong Kong (5.49 percent) as of 2009. Its main exports are transportation equipment, motor vehicles, electronics, electrical machinery and chemicals.Japan's main import markets as of 2009 are China (22.2 percent), the US (10.96 percent), Australia (6.29 percent), Saudi Arabia (5.29 percent), United Arab Emirates (4.12 percent), South Korea (3.98 percent) and Indonesia (3.95 percent). Its main imports are machinery and equipment, fossil fuels, foodstuffs (in particular beef), chemicals, textiles and raw materials for its industries. By market share measures, domestic markets are the least open of any OECD country. Junichiro Koizumi's administration began some pro-competition reforms, and foreign investment in Japan has soared.
Japan ranks 12th of 178 countries in the 2008 Ease of Doing Business Index and has one of the smallest tax revenues of the developed world. The Japanese variant of capitalism has many distinct features: keiretsu enterprises are influential, and lifetime employment and seniority-based career advancement are relatively common in the Japanese work environment. Japanese companies are known for management methods like "The Toyota Way", and shareholder activism is rare. Some of the largest enterprises in Japan include Toyota, Nintendo, NTT DoCoMo, Canon, Honda, Takeda Pharmaceutical, Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Sharp, Nippon Steel, Nippon Oil, and Seven & I Holdings Co. It has some of the world's largest banks, and the Tokyo Stock Exchange (known for itsNikkei 225 and Topix indices) stands as the second largest in the world by market capitalization.Japan is home to 326 companies from the Forbes Global 2000 or 16.3 percent (as of 2006).
4. Germany - $3.628 Trillion
- Continent: Europe
- Capital city: Berlin
- Population: 81,799,600
- GDP per capita: $44,555
- Land Area: 357,021 km2
- Official languages: German
- Currency: EUR (Euro – €)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Germany has a social market economy with a highly qualified labour force, a large capital stock, a low level of corruption, and a high level of innovation. It has the largest national economy in Europe, the fourth largest by nominal GDP in the world,and the fifth largest by PPP in 2009. The service sector contributes approximately 71% of the total GDP, industry 28%, and agriculture 0.9%. The average national unemployment rate in 2010 was about 7.5%. First estimates indicate a 3.6% increase in the price-adjusted GDP for 2010, following a 4.7% drop in 2009
Germany is a founding member of the EU, the G8 and the G20, and was the world's largest exporter from 2003 to 2008. In 2009 it remained the second largest exporter and third largest importer of goods. Most of the country's exports are in engineering, especially machinery, automobiles, chemical goods and metals. Germany is a leading producer of wind turbines and solar-power technology.Annual trade fairs and congresses are held in cities throughout Germany
Germany is an advocate of closer European economic and political integration. Its commercial policies are increasingly determined by agreements among European Union (EU) members and by EU legislation. Germany introduced the common European currency, the euro, on 1 January 2002.Its monetary policy is set by the European Central Bank. Two decades after German reunification, standards of living and per capita incomes remain significantly higher in the states of the former West Germany than in the former East. The modernisation and integration of the eastern German economy is a long-term process scheduled to last until the year 2019, with annual transfers from west to east amounting to roughly $80 billion. In January 2009 the German government approved a €50 billion economic stimulus plan to protect several sectors from a downturn and a subsequent rise in unemployment rates.
Of the world's 500 largest stock-market-listed companies measured by revenue in 2010, the Fortune Global 500, 37 are headquartered in Germany. 30 Germany-based companies are included in the DAX, the German stock market index. Well-known global brands are Mercedes-Benz, BMW, SAP, Siemens, Volkswagen, Adidas, Audi, Allianz, Porsche, and Nivea.[101] Germany is recognised for its specialised small and medium enterprises. Around 1,000 of these companies are global market leaders in their segment and are labelled hidden champions.
The list includes the largest companies by turnover in 2009. Unranked are the largest bank and the largest insurance company in 2007:
| Rank[103] | Name | Headquarters | Revenue (Mil. €) | Profit (Mil. €) | Employees (World) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Volkswagen AG | Wolfsburg | 108,897 | 4,120 | 329,305 |
| 2 | Daimler AG | Stuttgart | 99,399 | 3,985 | 272,382 |
| 3 | Siemens AG | Munich/Berlin | 72,488 | 3,806 | 398,200 |
| 4 | E.ON AG | Düsseldorf | 68,731 | 7,204 | 87,815 |
| 5 | Metro AG | Düsseldorf | 64,337 | 825 | 242,378 |
| 6 | Deutsche Post AG | Bonn | 63,512 | 1,389 | 475,100 |
| 7 | Deutsche Telekom AG | Bonn | 62,516 | 569 | 241,426 |
| 8 | BASF SE | Ludwigshafen | 57,951 | 4,065 | 95,175 |
| 9 | BMW AG | Munich | 56,018 | 3,126 | 107,539 |
| 10 | ThyssenKrupp AG | Essen/Duisburg | 51,723 | 2,102 | 191,350 |
5. France - $2.808 Trillion
Continent: Europe
- Capital city: Paris
- Population: 65,821,885
- GDP per capita: $44,400
- Land Area: 674,843 km2
- Official languages: French
- Currency: EUR (Euro – €), CFP Franc
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A member of the G8 group of leading industrialised countries, it is ranked as the world's fifth largest and Europe's second largest economy by nominal GDP; with 39 of the 500 biggest companies of the world in 2010, France ranks world's 4th and Europe's 1st in the Fortune Global 500 ahead of Germany and the UK. France joined 11 other EU members to launch the euro on 1 January 1999, with euro coins and banknotes completely replacing the French franc (₣) in early 2002.
France has a mixed economy which combines extensive private enterprise (nearly 2.5 million companies registered) with substantial (though declining) state enterprise and government intervention (see dirigisme). The government retains considerable influence over key segments of infrastructure sectors, with majority ownership of railway, electricity, aircraft, nuclear power and telecommunications.[159] It has been gradually relaxing its control over these sectors since the early 1990s. The government is slowly corporatising the state sector and selling off holdings in France Télécom, Air France, as well as the insurance, banking, and defence industries.[159] France has an important aerospace industry led by the European consortiumAirbus, and has its own national spaceport, the Centre Spatial Guyanais.
According to the World Trade Organization (WTO), in 2009 France was the world's sixth-largest exporter and the fourth-largest importer of manufactured goods. In 2008, France was the third-largest recipient of foreign direct investment among OECD countries at $117.9 billion, ranking behind Luxembourg (where foreign direct investment was essentially monetary transfers to banks located in that country) and the United States ($316.1 billion), but above the United Kingdom ($96.9 billion), Germany ($24.9 billion), or Japan ($24.4 billion). In the same year, French companies invested $220 billion outside of France, ranking France as the second most important outward direct investor in the OECD, behind the United States ($311.8 billion), and ahead of the United Kingdom ($111.4 billion), Japan ($128 billion) and Germany ($156.5 billion).With 39 of the 500 biggest companies of the world in 2010, France ranks 4th in the Fortune Global 500, behind the USA, Japan and China, but ahead of Germany and the UK.
Financial services, banking and the insurance sector are an important part of France's economy. The Paris stock exchange market (French: La Bourse de Paris) is an ancient institution, as it was created by Louis XV in 1724.[164] In 2000, the stock exchanges of Paris, Amsterdam and Bruxelles merged intoEuronext.[165] In 2007, Euronext merged with the New York stock exchange to form NYSE Euronext, the world's largest stock exchange.[165] Euronext Paris, the French branch of the NYSE Euronext group is Europe's second largest stock exchange market, behind the London Stock Exchange.
French companies have maintained key positions in the Insurance and Banking industries: AXA is the world's largest insurance company, and is ranked byFortune the ninth richest corporation by revenues.
The leading French banks are BNP Paribas and the Crédit Agricole, ranking as the world's 1st and 6th largest banks in 2010 (determined by the amount of assets), while the Société Générale group was ranked the world's eight largest in 2008–2009.
France is the smallest emitter of carbon dioxide among the seven most industrialized countries in the world, due to its heavy investment in nuclear power.As a result of large investments in nuclear technology, most of the electricity produced in the country is generated by 59 nuclear power plants (78% in 2006, up from only 8% in 1973, 24% in 1980, and 75% in 1990). In this context, renewable energies (see the power cooperative Enercoop) are having difficulties taking off the ground.
6. United Kingdom - $2.603 Trillion
- Continent: Europe
- Capital city: London
- Population: 62,262,000
- GDP per capita: $39,459
- Land Area: 243,610 km2
- Official languages: English
- Currency: GBP (Pound Sterling)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The UK has a partially regulated market economy. Based on market exchange rates the UK is today the sixth-largest economy in the world and the third-largest in Europe after Germany and France, having fallen behind France for the first time in over a decade in 2008.HM Treasury, led by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, is responsible for developing and executing the British government's public finance policy and economic policy. The Bank of England is the UK's central bank and is responsible for issuing the nation's currency, the pound sterling. Banks in Scotland and Northern Ireland retain the right to issue their own notes, subject to retaining enough Bank of England notes in reserve to cover their issue. Pound sterling is the world's third-largest reserve currency (after the U.S. Dollar and the Euro). Since 1997 the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee, headed by the Governor of the Bank of England, has been responsible for setting interest rates at the level necessary to achieve the overall inflation target for the economy that is set by the Chancellor each year.
In the final quarter of 2008 the UK economy officially entered recession for the first time since 1991.Unemployment increased from 5.2% in May 2008 to 7.6% in May 2009 and by January 2011 the unemployment rate among 18 to 24-year-olds had risen from 11.9% to 20.3%, the highest since current records began in 1992.Total UK government debt rose from 44.5% of GDP in December 2007 to 76.1% of GDP in December 2010.
The UK service sector makes up around 73% of GDP.[200] London is one of the three "command centres" of the global economy (alongside New York City and Tokyo), is the world's largest financial centre alongside New York, and has the largest city GDP in Europe.[203] Edinburgh is also one of the largest financial centres in Europe.[204] Tourism is very important to the British economy and, with over 27 million tourists arriving in 2004, the United Kingdom is ranked as the sixth major tourist destination in the world and London has the most international visitors of any city in the world.The creative industries accounted for 7% GVA in 2005 and grew at an average of 6% per annum between 1997 and 2005.
The Industrial Revolution started in the UK with an initial concentration on the textile industry, followed by other heavy industries such as shipbuilding, coal mining, and Steelmaking.The empire created an overseas market for British products, allowing the UK to dominate international trade in the 19th century. As other nations industrialised, coupled with economic decline after two world wars, the United Kingdom began to lose its competitive advantage and heavy industry declined, by degrees, throughout the 20th century. Manufacturing remains a significant part of the economy but accounted for only 16.7% of national output in 2003.
The automotive industry is a significant part of the UK manufacturing sector and employs over 800,000 people, with a turnover of some £52 billion, generating £26.6 billion of exports.Theaerospace industry of the UK is the second- or third-largest national aerospace industry depending upon the method of measurement and has an annual turnover of around £20 billion.Thepharmaceutical industry plays an important role in the UK economy and the country has the third highest share of global pharmaceutical R&D expenditures (after the United States and Japan).
The poverty line in the UK is commonly defined as being 60% of the median household income.In 2007–2008 13.5 million people, or 22% of the population, lived below this line. This is a higher level of relative poverty than all but four other EU members. In the same year 4.0 million children, 31% of the total, lived in households below the poverty line after housing costs were taken into account. This is a decrease of 400,000 children since 1998–1999.The UK imports 40% of its food supplies.
7. Brazil - $2.422 Trillion
- Continent: South America
- Capital city: Brasilia
- Population: 192,376,496
- GDP per capita: $12,423
- Land Area: 8,514,877 km2
- Official languages: Portuguese
- Currency: BRL (Brazilian Real – R$)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Brazil is the largest national economy in Latin America, the world's seventh largest economy at market exchange rates and theeighth largest in purchasing power parity (PPP), according to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. Brazil has amixed economy with abundant natural resources. The Brazilian economy has been predicted to become one of the five largest in the world in the decades to come, the GDP per capita following and growing. Its current GDP (PPP) per capita is $10,200, putting Brazil in the 64th position according to World Bank data. It has large and developed agricultural, mining, manufacturing and service sectors, as well as a large labor pool.
Brazilian exports are booming, creating a new generation of tycoons. Major export products include aircraft, electrical equipment, automobiles, ethanol, textiles, footwear, iron ore, steel, coffee,orange juice, soybeans and corned beef. The country has been expanding its presence in international financial and commodities markets, and is one of a group of four emerging economies called the BRIC countries.
Brazil pegged its currency, the real, to the U.S. dollar in 1994. However, after the East Asian financial crisis, the Russian default in 1998 and the series of adverse financial events that followed it, the Central Bank of Brazil temporarily changed its monetary policy to a managed-float scheme while undergoing a currency crisis, until definitively changing the exchange regime to free-float in January 1999.
Brazil received an International Monetary Fund rescue package in mid-2002 of $30.4 billion, then a record sum. Brazil's central bank paid back the IMF loan in 2005, although it was not due to be repaid until 2006. One of the issues the Central Bank of Brazil recently dealt with was an excess of speculative short-term capital inflows to the country, which may have contributed to a fall in the value of the U.S. dollar against the real during that period. Nonetheless, foreign direct investment(FDI), related to long-term, less speculative investment in production, is estimated to be $193.8 billion for 2007. Inflation monitoring and control currently plays a major part in the Central bank's role of setting out short-term interest rates as a monetary policy measure.
Between 1993 and 2010, 7'012 mergers & acquisitions with a total known value of $707 billion with the involvement of Brazlian firms have been announced. The year 2010 was a new record in terms of value with 115 bil. USD of transactions. The largest transaction with involvement of Brazilian companies has been: Cia Vale do Rio Doce acquired Inco in a tender offer valued at $18.9 billion USD.
The purchasing power in Brazil is eroded by the so-called Brazil cost.
8. Italy - $2.245 Trillion
Continent: Europe- Capital city: Rome
- Population: 60,681,514
- GDP per capita: $37,046
- Land Area: 301,338 km2
- Official languages: Italian
- Currency: EUR (Euro – €)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Italy has a free market economy characterized by high per capita GDP and low unemployment rates. In 2010, it was the eighth-largest economy in the world and the fourth-largest in Europe in terms of nominal GDP, and the tenth-largest economy in the world and fifth-largest in Europe in terms of PPP. It is a founding member of the G8, the Eurozone and the OECD.
After World War II, Italy was rapidly transformed from an agriculture based economy into one of the world's most industrialized nations and a leading country in world trade and exports. It is adeveloped country, with the world's 8th highest quality of life and the 23rd Human Development Index. In spite of the recent global economic crisis, Italian per capita GDP at purchasing power parity remains approximately equal to the EU average, while the unemployment rate (8.5%) stands as one of the EU's lowest. The country is well known for its influential and innovative business economic sector, an industrious and competitive agricultural sector (Italy is the world's largest wine producer), and for its creative and high-quality automobile, industrial, appliance and fashion design.
Italy has a smaller number of global multinational corporations than other economies of comparable size, but there is a large number of small and medium-sized enterprises, notoriously clustered in several industrial districts, which are the backbone of the Italian industry. This has produced a manufacturing sector often focused on the export of niche market and luxury products, that if on one side is less capable to compete on the quantity, on the other side is more capable of facing the competition from China and other emerging Asian economies based on lower labour costs, with higher quality products. The country was the world's 7th largest exporter in 2009. Italy's closest trade ties are with the other countries of the European Union, with whom it conducts about 59% of its total trade. Its largest EU trade partners, in order of market share, are Germany (12.9%), France (11.4%), and Spain (7.4%).Finally, tourism is one of the fastest growing and profitable sectors of the national economy: with 43.6 million international tourist arrivals and total receipts estimated at $38.8 billion in 2010, Italy is both the fifth most visited country and highest tourism earner in the world.
Despite these important achievements, the Italian economy today suffers from many and relevant problems. After a strong GDP growth of 5–6% per year from the 1950s to the early 1970s, and a progressive slowdown in the 1980s and 1990s, the last decade's average annual growth rates poorly performed at 1.23% in comparison to an average EU annual growth rate of 2.28%. The stagnation in economic growth, and the political efforts to revive it with massive government spending from the 1980s onwards, eventually produced a severe rise in public debt. According to the EU's statistics body Eurostat, Italian public debt stood at 116% of GDP in 2010, ranking as the second biggest debt ratio after Greece (with 126.8%).However, the biggest chunk of Italian public debt is owned by national subjects, a major difference between Italy and GreeceIn addition, Italian living standards have a considerable north-south divide. The average GDP per capita in the north exceeds by far the EU average, whilst many regions of Southern Italy are dramatically below. Italy has often been referred the sick man of Europe, characterised by economic stagnation, political instability and problems in pursuing reform programs.
More specifically, Italy suffers from structural weaknesses due to its geographical conformation and the lack of raw materials and energy resources: in 2006 the country imported more than 86% of its total energy consumption (99.7% of the solid fuels, 92.5% of oil, 91.2% of natural gas and 15% of electricity).The Italian economy is weakened by the lack of infrastructure development, market reforms and research investment, and also high public deficit. In the Index of Economic Freedom 2008, the country ranked 64th in the world and 29th in Europe, the lowest rating in theEurozone. Italy still receives development assistance from the European Union every year. Between 2000 and 2006, Italy received €27.4 billion from the EU.[100] The country has an inefficient state bureaucracy, low property rights protection and high levels of corruption, heavy taxation and public spending that accounts for about half of the national GDP. In addition, the most recent data show that Italy's spending in R&D in 2006 was equal to 1.14% of GDP, below the EU average of 1.84% and the Lisbon Strategy target of devoting 3% of GDP to research and development activities.According to the Confesercenti, a major business association in Italy, organized crime in Italy represented the "biggest segment of the Italian economy", accounting for €90 billion in receipts and 7% of Italy's GDP.
9. India – $1.843 Trillion
- Continent: Asia
- Capital city: New Delhi
- Population: 1,210,193,422
- GDP per capita: $1,527
- Land Area: 3,287,263 km2
- Official languages: Hindi, English
- Currency: INR (Indian Rupee)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
According to the International Monetary Fund, as of 2011, the Indian economy is nominally worth US$1.843 trillion; it is the tenth-largest economy by market exchange rates, and is, at US$4.469 trillion, the third-largest by purchasing power parity, or PPP.With its average annual GDP growth rate of 5.8% over the past two decades, and reaching 10.4% during 2010, India is one of theworld's fastest-growing economies.However, the country ranks 138th in the world in nominal GDP per capita and 129th in GDP per capita at PPP. Until 1991, all Indian governments followedprotectionist policies that were influenced by socialist economics. Widespread state intervention and regulation largely walled the economy off from the outside world. An acute balance of payments crisis in 1991 forced the nation to liberalise its economy; since then it has slowly moved towards a free-market system by emphasizing both foreign trade and direct investment inflows. India's recent economic model is largely capitalist.
The 467-million worker Indian labour force is the world's second-largest.The service sector makes up 54% of GDP, the agricultural sector 28%, and the industrial sector 18%. Major agricultural products include rice, wheat, oilseed, cotton, jute, tea, sugarcane, and potatoes. Major industries include textiles, telecommunications, chemicals, food processing, steel, transport equipment, cement, mining, petroleum, machinery, and software.[160] In 2006, the share of external trade in India's GDP stood at 24%, up from 6% in 1985. In 2008, India's share of world trade was 1.68%; India was the world's fifteenth-largest importer in 2009 and the eighteenth-largest exporter.Major exports include petroleum products, textile goods, jewelry, software, engineering goods, chemicals, and leather manufactures.Major imports include crude oil, machinery, gems, fertiliser, and chemicals.Between 2001 and 2011, the contribution of petrochemical and engineering goods to total exports grew from 14% to 42%.
Averaging an economic growth rate of 7.5% during the last few years, India has more than doubled its hourly wage rates during the last decade. Some 431 million Indians have left poverty since 1985; India's middle classes are projected to number around 580 million by 2030.Though ranking 51st in global competitiveness, India ranks 17th in financial market sophistication, 24th in the banking sector, 44th in business sophistication, and 39th in innovation, ahead of several advanced economies. With 7 of the world's top 15 information technology outsourcing companies based in India, the country is viewed as the second-most favourable outsourcing destination after the United States.India's consumer market, currently the world's thirteenth-largest, is expected to become fifth-largest by 2030.Itstelecommunication industry, the world's fastest-growing, added 227 million subscribers during the period 2010–11. Its automotive industry, the world's second fastest growing, increased domestic sales by 26% during 2009–10, and exports by 36% during 2008–09. Power capacity is 250 gigawatts, of which 8% is renewable.
Despite impressive economic growth during recent decades, India continues to face socio-economic challenges. India contains the largest concentration of people living below the World Bank's international poverty line of US$1.25 per day, the proportion having decreased from 60% in 1981 to 42% in 2005.Half of the children in India are underweight, and 46% of children under the age of three suffer from malnutrition. The Mid-Day Meal Scheme attempts to lower these rates. Since 1991, economic inequality between India's states has consistently grown: the per-capita net state domestic productof the richest states in 2007 was 3.2 times that of the poorest.Corruption in India is perceived to have increased significantly, with one report estimating the illegal capital flows since independence to be US$462 billion.Driven by growth, India's nominal GDP per capita has steadily increased from US$329 in 1991, when economic liberalisation began, to US$1,265 in 2010, and is estimated to increase to US$2,110 by 2016; however, it has always remained lower than those of other Asian developing countries such as Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, and is expected to remain so in the near future.
According to a 2011 PricewaterhouseCoopers report, India's GDP at purchasing power parity could overtake that of the United States by 2045. During the next four decades, Indian GDP is expected to grow at an annualised average of 8%, making it potentially the world's fastest-growing major economy until 2050. The report highlights key growth factors: a young and rapidly growing working-age population; growth in the manufacturing sector due to rising education and engineering skill levels; and sustained growth of the consumer market driven by a rapidly growing middle class. The World Bank cautions that, for India to achieve its economic potential, it must continue to focus on public sector reform, transport infrastructure, agricultural and rural development, removal of labour regulations, education, energy security, and public healthand nutrition.
10. Canada – $1,759 Trillion
- Continent: North America
- Capital city: Ottawa
- Population: 34,753,000
- GDP per capita: $51,147
- Land Area: 9,984,670 km2
- Official languages: English, French
- Currency: CAD (Canadian Dollar – $)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Canada is one of the world's wealthiest nations, with a 2011 nominal GDP of approximately US$1.75 trillion, and a very high per-capita income. It is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the G8, and is one of the world's top ten trading nations. Canada is a mixed economy, ranking above the US and most western European nations on theHeritage Foundation's index of economic freedom.The largest foreign importers of Canadian goods are the United States, the United Kingdom, and Japan.
In the past century, the growth of Canada's manufacturing, mining, and service sectors has transformed the nation from a largely rural economy to an advanced, urbanized, industrial one. Like many other First World nations, the Canadian economy is dominated by the service industry, which employs about three-quarters of the country's workforce. However, Canada is unusual among developed countries in the importance of its primary sector, in which the logging and petroleum industries are two of the most prominent elements.
Canada is one of the few developed nations that are net exporters of energy.[135] Atlantic Canada possesses vast offshore deposits of natural gas, and Alberta also hosts large oil and gas resources. The immense Athabasca oil sands give Canada the world's second-largest proven oil reserves, after Saudi Arabia.[136] Canada is additionally one of the world's largest suppliers of agricultural products; the Canadian Prairies are one of the most important global producers of wheat, canola, and other grains. Canada is the largest producer of zinc and uranium, and is a leading exporter of many other natural resources, such as gold, nickel, aluminum, and lead.[135] Many towns in northern Canada, where agriculture is difficult, are sustainable because of nearby mines or sources of timber. Canada also has a sizable manufacturing sector centred in southern Ontario and Quebec, with automobiles and aeronautics representing particularly important industries.
Canada's economic integration with the United States has increased significantly since World War II. The Automotive Products Trade Agreement of 1965 opened the country's borders to trade in the automobile manufacturing industry. In the 1970s, concerns over energy self-sufficiency and foreign ownership in the manufacturing sectors prompted Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's Liberal government to enact the National Energy Program (NEP) and the Foreign Investment Review Agency (FIRA).In the 1980s, Prime Minister Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservatives abolished the NEP and changed the name of FIRA to "Investment Canada", in order to encourage foreign investment. The Canada – United States Free Trade Agreement (FTA) of 1988 eliminated tariffs between the two countries, while the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) expanded the free-trade zone to include Mexico in 1994.[137] In the mid-1990s, the Liberal government under Jean Chrétien began to post annual budgetary surpluses, and steadily paid down the national debt.
In 2008, Canada's imported goods were worth over $442.9 billion, of which $280.8 billion originated from the United States, $11.7 billion from Japan, and $11.3 billion from the United Kingdom.The country’s 2009 trade deficit totaled C$4.8 billion, compared with a C$46.9 billion surplus in 2008.
The global financial crisis of 2008 caused a major recession, which led to rising unemployment in Canada. As of October 2009, Canada's national unemployment rate stands at 8.6 percent. Provincial unemployment rates vary from a low of 5.8 percent in Manitoba to a high of 17 percent in Newfoundland and Labrador. Between October 2008 and October 2010, the Canadian labour market lost 162,000 full-time jobs and a total of 224,000 permanent jobs. Canada's federal debt is estimated to total $566.7 billion for the 2010–11 fiscal year, up from $463.7 billion in 2008–09. Canada’s net foreign debt rose by $41 billion to $194 billion in the first quarter of 2010.
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