Political Calculations
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29 August 2007
2006 GDP Rankings for the Americas

Political Map of South America, 2006 Political Map of North America, 2006The third stop in our continuing series comparing the relative economic performance of the nations of the world brings us to the entire Western Hemisphere!

As in previous weeks, we've once again provided a dynamic ranking table to show each of the countries' Gross Domestic Product (GDP) adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), their population and GDP-PPP per Capita for 2006. We've also determined each country's annualized rate of growth of their GDP-PPP per capita since 2004.

As we've seen in our rankings from previous weeks, the fastest growing nations in our survey all share a unique economic characteristic, or rather, they share one particular industry that has seen major growth as a major component of their economies. Unlike previous weeks though, it's not the oil industry - we'll have the answer to which industry it is below the table.

Speaking of which, you may sort the data in our dynamic table below by clicking any of the column headings. Doing so will sort the data in the table from low to high value or from high to low (by clicking a column heading a second time.) To restore the original order, you'll need to refresh the page in your web browser.

2006 GDP-PPP for the Americas
Country Population GDP-PPP GDP-PPP per Capita Pop. Est. Date GDP Est. Date % Change GDP-PPP per Capita, Since 2004
Antigua and Barbuda 69,108 1,145,000,000 16,568.27 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 22.9%
Argentina 39,921,833 608,800,000,000 15,249.8 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 11.1%
Aruba 103,484 2,396,000,000 23,153.34 July 2006 est. 2006 est. [2] 3.1%
Bahamas, The 303,770 6,556,000,000 21,582.12 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 10.5%
Barbados 279,912 5,146,000,000 18,384.35 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 5.8%
Belize 287,730 2,307,000,000 8,017.93 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 10.9%
Bolivia 8,989,046 27,870,000,000 3,100.44 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 10.1%
Brazil 188,078,227 1,655,000,000,000 8,799.53 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 4.2%
British Virgin Islands 23,098 1,008,000,000 43,640.14 July 2006 est. 2006 est. [2] 6.5%
Canada 33,098,932 1,178,000,000,000 35,590.27 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 6.3%
Cayman Islands 45,436 2,472,000,000 54,406.2 July 2006 est. 2006 est. [2] 11.5%
Chile 16,134,219 202,700,000,000 12,563.36 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 8.4%
Colombia 43,593,035 374,400,000,000 8,588.53 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 13.7%
Costa Rica 4,075,261 50,890,000,000 12,487.54 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 14.1%
Cuba 11,382,820 45,510,000,000 3,998.13 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 15.5%
Dominica 71,727 485,000,000 6,761.75 July 2006 est. 2006 est. [1] 10.4%
Dominican Republic 9,183,984 77,090,000,000 8,393.96 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 15.4%
Ecuador 13,547,510 61,520,000,000 4,541.06 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 10.1%
El Salvador 6,822,378 33,680,000,000 4,936.7 July 2006 est. 2006 est. .3%
Grenada 89,703 982,000,000 10,947.24 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 49.1%
Guatemala 12,293,545 61,380,000,000 4,992.86 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 9.5%
Guyana 767,245 3,711,000,000 4,836.79 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 8.5%
Haiti 8,308,504 14,790,000,000 1,780.1 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 6.3%
Jamaica 2,758,124 12,820,000,000 4,648.09 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 6.4%
Mexico 107,449,525 1,149,000,000,000 10,693.39 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 5.6%
Netherlands Antilles 221,736 3,400,000,000 15,333.55 July 2006 est. 2006 est. [2] 16.8%
Nicaragua 5,570,129 17,330,000,000 3,111.24 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 16.3%
Panama 3,191,319 26,040,000,000 8,159.64 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 9.1%
Paraguay 6,506,464 31,260,000,000 4,804.45 July 2006 est. 2006 est. -.3%
Peru 28,302,603 186,600,000,000 6,593.03 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 8.1%
Puerto Rico 3,927,188 75,820,000,000 19,306.44 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 7.2%
Puerto Rico 3,927,188 75,820,000,000 19,306.44 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 7.2%
Saint Kitts and Nevis 39,129 726,000,000 18,554.01 July 2007 est. 2006 est. 45.8%
Saint Lucia 168,458 1,179,000,000 6,998.78 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 15.2%
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines 117,848 864,000,000 7,331.48 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 58.5%
Suriname 439,117 3,136,000,000 7,141.6 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 28.7%
Trinidad and Tobago 1,065,842 21,120,000,000 19,815.32 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 37.6%
United States 298,444,215 13,130,000,000,000 43,994.82 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 4.7%
Uruguay 3,431,932 37,540,000,000 10,938.45 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 11.2%
Venezuela 25,730,435 186,300,000,000 7,240.45 July 2006 est. 2006 est. 11.7%
The Americas (All) 884,834,571 19,300,973,000,000 21,813.09 July 2006 2006 5.7%

Caribbean Dreams

Political Map of Central America and the Caribbean, 2006 The big winners in growing their GDP-PPP per capita were many of the island nations of the Caribbean. While GDP-PPP figure is nearly double the previous year's figure with no good explanation, it's clear that the Caribbean was the place to be to realize rapid growth in the Western Hemisphere from 2004 to 2006.

The biggest clear winner would seem to be the island nation of Grenada. Here, the rebound of the island's tourism and agriculture industries following the destruction of Hurricane Ivan in 2004 helped seal a strong annualized rate of growth of 49.1% in GDP-PPP per capita over the two years since.

The next big winner would seem to be Saint Kitts and Nevis. Here, although we see the second greatest increase in GDP-PPP per capita in the western hemisphere, this result is partly an artifact of combination of the nation's decline in population and the revival of the tourism industry across the Caribbean from 2004 to 2006.

Here, the nation's population loss was in large part driven by its government's move to shut down its money-losing state-run sugar production operations in 2005, which resulted in an out-migration from the island. While this was happening however, the nation benefitted from the revival of tourism following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack against the United States, which greatly impacted this industry throughout the Caribbean. Strong tourism growth combined with a smaller population helps account for the nation's blistering 45.8% rate of GDP-PPP growth per capita.

Number three on the rapid growth rate scale is the nation of Trinidad and Tobago. Here, increased tourism combined with revenues from the island's oil refining and production operations, which benefitted from increasing world prices for oil and gasoline, helped deliver remarkable GDP-PPP per capita growth from 2004 to 2006.

Moving to the continents of North and South America, we find solid growth from Canada down through Chile, with some really impressive growth in Suriname, which has benefitted from higher world commodity prices for its large mining industry.

Sources and Acknowledgements:

Previously on Political Calculations

2006 Economic and Population Data

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

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- posted by Ironman at 8:25 PM | Permalink | Home |
21 December 2005
European Union 2004 GDP Rankings

Economically speaking, 2004 was a momentous year for the European Union, as the EU added ten new nations encompassing nearly 75 million people to its ranks. Political Calculations has mined the economic and population data for the world's Number 2 economic behemoth (after the United States) to produce the dynamic table below, which you may sort from A to Z, highest to lowest, richest to poorest (and vice-versa) by clicking upon the individual column headings. To make things more interesting, we've broken out the 2004 economic performance for the 15 members of the European Union prior to expansion (marked as "EU15" in the Group column below), the 10 new members who joined in May 2004 (marked as "EU25"), and finally the entire combined colossus (marked as "All"). Each nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has been adjusted for Purchasing Price Parity (PPP) with the results presented in Year 2004 U.S. dollars (USD).

European Union 2004 GDP-PPP, Population and GDP-PPP per Capita
Country Group GDP-PPP (billions $USD) Population (2004 est.) GDP-PPP per Capita ($USD)
Austria EU15 255.9 8174762 31304
Belgium EU15 316.2 10348276 30556
Cyprus EU25 20.3 775927 26098
Czech Republic EU25 172.2 10246178 16806
Denmark EU15 174.4 5413392 32216
Estonia EU25 19.2 1341664 14333
Finland EU15 151.2 5214512 28996
France EU15 1737.0 60424213 28747
Germany EU15 2362.0 82424609 28656
Greece EU15 226.4 10647529 21263
Hungary EU25 149.3 10032375 14882
Ireland EU15 126.4 3969558 31842
Italy EU15 1609.0 58057477 27714
Latvia EU25 26.5 2306306 11503
Liechtenstein EU15 0.8 33436 24674
Lithuania EU25 45.2 3607899 12536
Luxembourg EU15 27.3 462690 58938
Malta EU25 7.2 396851 18201
Netherlands EU15 481.1 16318199 29482
Poland EU25 463.0 38626349 11987
Portugal EU15 188.7 10524145 17930
Slovakia EU25 78.9 5423567 14546
Slovenia EU25 39.4 2011473 19593
Spain EU15 937.6 40280780 23277
Sweden EU15 255.4 8986400 28421
United Kingdom EU15 1782.0 60270708 29567
EU15 EU15 10631.4 381550686 27864
EU25 EU25 1021.3 74768589 13659
European Union All 11652.7 456319275 25536

Looking at the New Members

When the European Union expanded to 25 members in 2004, the 10 nations it added, if taken together and considered to be just one nation, would rank behind Italy as the fifth largest nation of the European Union in terms of GDP-PPP and second behind Germany in population. The 10 nations combined would also collectively be the poorest nation of the European Union, falling well behind the poorest EU15 nation of Portugal in the measure of GDP-PPP per capita - a legacy of the totalitarian governments and communist economic systems that constricted many of the new members' economic production potential for much of the twentieth century.

The Richest and Poorest Nations of the EU

There are actually three subcategories here, all measured by GDP-PPP per capita: the richest and poorest nations of the EU15 (the members of the European Union before 2004), the richest and poorest nations of the EU25 (the nations that joined in 2004) and finally, the richest and poorest nations of the entire European Union.

For the EU15, the richest nation is Luxembourg, whose status as a tax haven gives this small nation an outsized GDP given the associated strength of its banking and financial sectors, followed by Denmark. The poorest EU15 nation is Portugal, whose GDP-PPP per capita of $17,930 USD falls well behind next poorest EU15 nation Greece.

Looking at the ten nations that joined the European Union in 2004, the richest is the island nation of Cyprus (including the Turkish-Cypriot controlled portion of the island), followed by Slovenia. The poorest nation among the ten new EU members is Latvia, which is closely followed by Poland in the GDP-PPP per capita ranking.

For the EU as a whole, Luxembourg is the richest nation and Latvia is the poorest. Of the 10 new members added in 2004, only Cyprus ranks ahead of the average GDP-PPP per Capita of all twenty-five members of the EU.

Data Sources:

GDP-PPP Data: 2004 GDP-PPP Data for Individual Nations
Population Data: July 2004 Population Estimates
GSP and GDP per Capita: This data was calculated by simply dividing the published GDP-PPP data by each nation's population estimate for July 2004.

Previously on Political Calculations

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

- posted by Ironman at 9:07 AM | Permalink | Home |
12 September 2007
Redefining the Health Care Debate - Part 1

Today, we're going to redefine the way you look at health care spending among the nations of the world.

We're going to start by looking at the total Health Expenditures per Capita across the member nations of the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) against their Gross Domestic Product per Capita, adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity, for 2005: 2005 OECD Nations Health Care Expenditures per Capita vs GDP (PPP) per Capita

The chart above presents the data with a linear regression to show the traditional correlation between national economic output and health care spending. In it, we see that the United States appears to spend a disproportionate amount of money upon health care, especially as compared to the other member nations of the OECD.

Since many of the other OECD nations have national health care programs, it is often argued that the lack of such a comprehensive program in the United States accounts for the reason why its health care expenditures are so disproportionate with respect to its economic output per capita compared to those other nations. Advocates for such a program frequently cite this disparity as a reason why a universal health care program should be enacted in the U.S., where presently, such spending is comparatively unconstrained with respect to other nations of the world.

What's Wrong with That?

The problem with this view is that the analysis upon which it is based is flawed. For any comparative analysis to be valid, care must be taken to ensure that the fundamental units behind the analysis are directly comparable. Where a comparison between the United States and the other member nations of the OECD is involved, that means we must consider the size of the economic output of each nation, the total health expenditures for each, and the size of their populations.

Our following chart shows the total GDP (adjusted for PPP) for the member nations of the OECD for 2005, ranking the nations from low to high according to their 2005 GDP (PPP):

2005 GDP (PPP) for OECD Nations (billions $USD)

The next chart shows the total public and private Health Expenditures (adjusted for PPP) for the OECD nations. We obtained these figures by multiplying the 2005 Health Expenditures per Capita (from above) by the Population for each nation for that year. Again, the nations are ranked from low to high according to their 2005 GDP (PPP):

2005 Health Expenditures (PPP) for OECD Nations (billions $USD)

The third chart shows the total Population for the member nations of the OECD. As with the other two charts, the nations are ranked according to their 2005 GDP (PPP): 2005 Populations for OECD Nations (thousands)

What all three of these charts demonstrate is that the United States' economic output, health expenditures and population all completely dwarf those of the other nations, often by several orders of magnitude. These factors alone make nation-to-nation comparisons dicey at best, and outright misleading at worst. It would be more valid to compare individual states within the United States against many, if not all, of the other OECD member nations.

A Better Comparison

U.S. States Equivalent World Nation GDP So, why don't we do that? After all, it has been observed that the economic output of each of the U.S. states is comparable to that of other nations. Comparisons between the populations of individual U.S. states and OECD nations would certainly be more consistent.

It also makes sense in how the government health care programs that the United States does have are administered. Here, while the U.S. does not have a universal health care program covering its entire population, it does have several large-scale national health care programs, such as Medicare for the elderly, Medicaid for the poor, and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) (originally intended for poor children but being expanded to include children whose families can easily afford health care), among others. Many of these programs are administered at the state government level, which helps make a U.S. state to OECD nation comparison of more valid.

Our next chart takes our first chart showing the 2005 OECD Nations' Health Care Expenditures per Capita vs GDP (PPP) per Capita, and simply adds some fifty data points for the individual U.S. states (see Note 1 for a discussion of how we found these figures for 2005):

2005 OECD Nations' and 50 Individual U.S. States' Health Care Expenditures per Capita vs GDP (PPP) per Capita

We can see from this chart that the linear regression no longer does such a good job in describing the relationship between total health expenditures per capita and GDP (PPP) per capita for the set of data. We next sorted all our individual U.S. state and OECD member nation data from low to high on the basis of their GDP (PPP) per capita and used ZunZun's 2-D function finder to find a better regression model. We selected a sigmoid with offset function as being the best fit for the data, which we've shown in the chart below (we've also identified a number of the individual U.S. states in the chart, as well):

2005 OECD Nations' and 50 Individual U.S. States' Health Care Expenditures per Capita vs GDP (PPP) per Capita with Sigmoid Regression Model

Our tool below takes the formulation we found for our sigmoid regression model and provides the corresponding expected level of health expenditures for a given level of GDP (PPP):

GDP per Capita Data
Input Data Values
Gross Domestic Product per Capita ($USD)


Health Care Spending Data
Calculated Results Values
Total Health Care Expenditures per Capita ($USD)

We believe the sigmoid regression model provides a significantly better representation of the relationship between health care expenditures and economic output. While built from empirical data, it has an advantage over the linear regression model in that it better agrees with established economic theory.

The main weakness of the linear regression model is that it assumes that with increasing economic output (or income), increasing health care expenditures will result. The problem with this model however is that it also assumes that there are no diminishing returns to additional health expenditures. The economic "law" of diminishing marginal utility suggests that there is a limit to how much additional benefit an individual or a population may receive from additional spending for health care.

After a certain point, it's not worth spending more for additional health care because you're not getting the same bang for the buck.

These diminishing returns are reflected in the sigmoid regression model we've illustrated above. Instead of health expenditures forever escalating with increasing economic output (or national income), we instead find that amount of expected health expenditures for a given level of GDP (PPP) follows an S-shaped curve, one that rises with growing GDP (PPP) at the low range and transitions to a relatively fixed level at higher ranges of GDP (PPP), corresponding with the diminishing returns one should expect from additional health care spending.

Coming Soon

We'll discuss what this relationship really means for the U.S. and the nations of the world. A quick preview: the United States is, collectively, spending about as much as we should expect on health care with respect to its economic output. Nations with long established universal health care programs are, in effect, achieving their lower expenditures by suppressing the amount of health care their populations may receive below the more natural, unconstrained levels that we see in nations without such established national health care programs.

Notes

[1] Total health expenditures may be found by adding Personal Health Care Expenditures with the expenditures associated with government program administration, public health programs and investments. We were only able to find a projected value of Personal Health Care Expenditures of 1.6778 trillion US dollars for 2005 from Table 125 of the U.S. Census Bureau's 2007 Statistical Abstract of the United States, so we had to estimate this component for each of the states for 2005.

We did this by extracting the Personal Health Care Expenditures by State for 2004, which provided this component of the Total Health Care Expenditures for all 50 states and the U.S. as a whole. We found the percentage of each state's personal health expenditures with respect to that of the entire U.S. We then assumed that these percentages from 2004 would be relatively unchanged in 2005, and multiplied these percentages by the $1.6778 trillion projected national personal health expenditures we found earlier to approximate the state personal health expenditures.

We then divided all these figures by the populations of each state to find the Personal Health Expenditures per Capita for each of the states. We next took the OECD's projected value of U.S. total health expenditures per capita for 2005 of $6,401 and divided it by the U.S. personal health expenditures per capita of $5,660.40 (this figure is obtained by dividing the $,6778 trillion personal health expenditures by the 2005 U.S. population estimate of 296,410,404). This gives us a multiplication factor of 1.131, which represents the portion of total health expenditures associated with government program administration, public health programs and investments.

These costs were distributed among all the states by multiplying this factor by each state's estimated Personal Health Expenditures per Capita for 2005, thereby providing our estimate of the Total Health Expenditures per Capita for each individual state in the U.S.

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- posted by Ironman at 9:39 AM | Permalink | Home |
10 January 2006
GDP Rankings in Muslim Nations

Political Calculations has finally brought the Muslim nations of the world together (at least those nations for which Muslims represent a plurality of the population) in the following dynamic table as part of our ongoing 2004 GDP ranking series. In the table below, you may rank the nations from most to least economic output (as measured by each nation's Gross Domestic Product adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity), most to least populous, and finally from richest to poorest (according to GDP-PPP per capita) and vice versa. Just select any of the column headings below to rank the presented data according to the category you select!

2004 GDP-PPP, Population and GDP-PPP per Capita for Muslim Nations
Country GDP-PPP (billions $USD) Population (2004 est.) GDP-PPP per Capita
Afghanistan 21.5 28513677 754
Albania 17.5 3544808 4926
Algeria 212.3 32129324 6608
Azerbaijan 30.0 7868385 3814
Bahrain 13.0 677886 19192
Bangladesh 275.7 141340476 1951
Bosnia and Herzegovina 26.2 4007608 6540
Brunei 6.8 365251 18732
Burkina Faso 15.7 13574820 1159
Chad 15.7 9538544 1642
Comoros 0.4 651901 676
Cote d'Ivoire 24.8 17327724 1430
Djibouti 0.6 466900 1326
Egypt 316.3 76117421 4155
Eritrea 4.2 4447307 934
Ethiopia 54.9 67851281 809
Gambia, The 2.8 1546848 1809
Gaza Strip 0.8 1324991 580
Guinea 19.5 9246462 2109
Indonesia 827.4 238452952 3470
Iran 516.7 69018924 7486
Iraq 54.4 25374691 2144
Jordan 25.5 5611202 4544
Kazakhstan 118.4 15143704 7818
Kuwait 48.0 2257549 21262
Kyrgyzstan 8.5 5081429 1672
Lebanon 18.8 3777218 4985
Libya 37.5 5631585 6655
Maldives 1.3 339330 3684
Mali 11.0 11956788 920
Mauritania 5.5 2998563 1846
Mayotte 0.5 186026 2509
Malaysia 229.3 23522482 9748
Morocco 134.6 32209101 4179
Niger 9.7 11360538 855
Nigeria 125.7 137253133 916
Oman 38.1 2903165 13120
Pakistan 347.3 159196336 2182
Qatar 19.5 840290 23194
Saudi Arabia 310.2 25795938 12025
Senegal 18.4 10852147 1692
Somalia 4.6 8304601 554
Sudan 76.2 39148162 1946
Syria 60.4 18016874 3355
Tajikistan 8.0 7011556 1134
Tunisia 70.9 9974722 7106
Turkey 508.7 68893918 7384
Turkmenistan 27.6 4863169 5675
United Arab Emirates 63.7 2523915 25227
Uzbekistan 47.6 26410416 1802
West Bank 1.8 2311204 779
Yemen 16.3 20024867 811
Muslim Nations (All) 4850.6 1417788109 3421

The Richest and Poorest Nations of the Muslim World

The richest nation among the Muslim nations of the world continues to be the United Arab Emirates, followed by Qatar, Kuwait and Bahrain in 2004. This marks a significant jump for Kuwait and Bahrain from 2002, since both had previously ranked behind the nation of Brunei, whose GDP-PPP per capita has not significantly changed.

The poorest nation in the Muslim world is Somalia, followed by the Palestinian territory of the Gaza Strip, both of whose GDP-PPP per capita came in well behind the next lowest average economic output per person recorded by the island nation of Comoros.

The Biggest Change Since 2002

The undisputed economic growth champion of the Muslim regions of the world is the tiny island of Mayotte, which is under the jurisdiction of France. In 2002, Mayotte ranked at the very bottom of the Muslim world's GDP-PPP per capita, with an average economic output per person of $476 USD. In 2004, GDP-PPP per capita in Mayotte has surged to $2509 USD, an annualized growth rate of 129%! While the reasons for the increase of Mayotte's GDP-PPP per capita are unclear, the territory receives extensive financial aid from France and has been seeking to develop and diversify its agricultural economy.

Data Sources:

GDP-PPP Data: 2004 GDP-PPP Data for Individual Nations
Population Data: July 2004 Population Estimates
GSP and GDP per Capita: This data was calculated by simply dividing the published GDP-PPP data by each nation's population estimate for July 2004.

Previously on Political Calculations

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

- posted by Ironman at 8:22 AM | Permalink | Home |
16 December 2005
GDP in Africa: 2004

One of the things that I'm always surprised by is how many people come across this Scrappy Little-Read Blog(TM) by searching for GDP in Africa. To that end, today, we're updating our previous look at GDP in Africa with the latest data available, the figures released for GDP-PPP (Gross Domestic Product adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity), population and GDP-PPP per capita for 2004. The information is presented in a dynamic table format, which allows you to rank the data either from lowest to highest or vice-versa in the table by clicking the individual column headings:

GDP of African Nations: 2004
Country GDP-PPP (billions $USD) Population (2004 est.) GDP-PPP per Capita
Algeria 212.3 32129324 6608
Angola 23.2 10978552 2110
Benin 8.3 7250033 1150
Botswana 15.1 1561973 9635
Burkina Faso 15.7 13574820 1159
Burundi 4.0 6231221 642
Cameroon 30.2 16063678 1878
Cape Verde 0.6 415294 1445
Central African Republic 4.2 3742482 1135
Chad 15.7 9538544 1642
Congo, Democratic Republic of the 42.7 58317930 733
Congo, Republic of the 2.3 2998040 775
Cote d'Ivoire 24.8 17327724 1430
Djibouti 0.6 466900 1326
Egypt 316.3 76117421 4155
Equatorial Guinea 1.3 523051 2428
Eritrea 4.2 4447307 934
Ethiopia 54.9 67851281 809
Gabon 8.0 1355246 5878
Gambia, The 2.8 1546848 1809
Ghana 48.3 20757032 2325
Guinea 19.5 9246462 2109
Guinea-Bissau 1.0 1388363 726
Kenya 34.7 32021856 1083
Lesotho 5.9 1865040 3159
Liberia 2.9 3390635 856
Libya 37.5 5631585 6655
Madagascar 14.6 17501871 832
Malawi 7.4 11906855 622
Maldives 1.3 339330 3684
Mali 11.0 11956788 920
Mauritania 5.5 2998563 1846
Mauritius 15.7 1220481 12847
Morocco 134.6 32209101 4179
Mozambique 23.4 18811731 1243
Namibia 14.8 1954033 7554
Niger 9.7 11360538 855
Nigeria 125.7 137253133 916
Rwanda 10.4 7954013 1311
Sao Tome and Principe 0.2 181565 1179
Senegal 18.4 10852147 1692
Sierra Leone 3.3 5883889 567
Somalia 4.6 8304601 554
South Africa 491.4 42718530 11503
Sudan 76.2 39148162 1946
Swaziland 6.0 1169241 5147
Tanzania 23.7 36588225 648
Togo 8.7 5556812 1563
Tunisia 70.9 9974722 7106
Uganda 39.4 26404543 1492
Zambia 9.4 10462436 899
Zimbabwe 24.4 12671860 1923
Africa (All) 2087.7 872121812 2394

Analyzing the Data

The Richest and Poorest Nations of Africa

The richest nations in Africa in 2004 are unchanged from the previous 2002 data. The island nation of Mauritius is still the top-ranked (according to GDP-PPP per capita), with the nations of South Africa and Botswana next in line.

At the other end of the spectrum, the poorest nation in Africa is Somalia, which swapped places with 2002's poorest African nation Sierra Leone in this 2004's rankings.

Biggest Changes Since 2002

The biggest drop between 2002 and 2004 occurred for Liberia, whose civil war in the intervening years saw the nation's GDP-PPP per capita reduced by nearly 20%. The nations of the Central African Republic, Guinea-Bissau, Libya and Zimbabwe also saw substantial declines (greater than 10%) in GDP-PPP per capita during this period as well.

At the positive end, Chad realized a more than 51% gain in its GDP-PPP per capita between 2002 and 2004. The next greatest increase occurred in Angola, which saw a 34% increase in its GDP-PPP per capita.

Data Sources:

GDP-PPP Data: 2004 GDP-PPP Data for Individual Nations
Population Data: July 2004 Population Estimates
GSP and GDP per Capita: This data was calculated by simply dividing the published GDP-PPP data by each nation's population estimate for July 2004.

Previously on Political Calculations

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

Labels:

- posted by Ironman at 9:27 AM | Permalink | Home |
23 December 2008
2007 US vs EU GDP-PPP Cage Match Contest

U.S. and EU Map, 2007 Once again, for no reason other than that it's really popular (and that we actually received an e-mail requesting an update), we've thrown the nations of the European Union into an economic cage match against the individual United States to find out where they all rank with respect to each other!

In our version of an economic cage match, the only deciding factor is how each nation ranks with respect to each others Gross Domestic Product (GDP) adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), population and their GDP-PPP per Capita. What makes this version different from last year's smackdown is that we've updated it all, using data exclusively from 2007.

We've put this data into the dynamic table you see below, which will allow you to sort the data in the table by clicking on the various column headings. Doing so will almost instantaneously sort the data in the table from low to high value or from high to low (by clicking a column heading a second time.) To restore the original order, you'll need to refresh this page in your web browser.

We'll have some more commentary below the table - in the meantime, you know you can't resist....

2006 GDP-PPP Rankings of EU Nations vs Individual US States
US State or EU Nation 2007 GDP-PPP
[billions USD]		 2007 Population 2007 GDP-PPP
per Capita [USD]
United States - All 13,743.02 301,621,157 45,563.85
US - Alabama 165.80 4,627,851 35,825.70
US - Alaska 44.52 683,478 65,133.04
US - Arizona 247.03 6,338,755 38,971.06
US - Arkansas 95.37 2,834,797 33,642.97
US - California 1,812.97 36,553,215 49,598.04
US - Colorado 236.32 4,861,515 48,611.18
US - Connecticut 216.27 3,502,309 61,749.55
US - Delaware 60.12 864,764 69,519.55
US - District of Columbia 93.82 588,282 159,479.64
US - Florida 734.52 18,251,243 40,244.88
US - Georgia 396.50 9,544,750 41,541.58
US - Hawaii 61.53 1,283,388 47,944.97
US - Idaho 51.15 1,499,402 34,112.93
US - Illinois 609.57 12,852,548 47,427.95
US - Indiana 246.44 6,345,289 38,838.10
US - Iowa 129.03 2,988,046 43,180.73
US - Kansas 117.31 2,775,997 42,256.89
US - Kentucky 154.18 4,241,474 36,351.51
US - Louisiana 216.15 4,293,204 50,346.08
US - Maine 48.11 1,317,207 36,522.73
US - Maryland 268.69 5,618,344 47,822.81
US - Massachusetts 351.51 6,449,755 54,500.36
US - Michigan 381.96 10,071,822 37,923.92
US - Minnesota 254.97 5,197,621 49,055.14
US - Mississippi 88.55 2,918,785 30,336.60
US - Missouri 229.47 5,878,415 39,036.03
US - Montana 34.25 957,861 35,759.89
US - Nebraska 80.09 1,774,571 45,133.73
US - Nevada 127.21 2,565,382 49,588.33
US - New Hampshire 57.34 1,315,828 43,577.88
US - New Jersey 465.48 8,685,920 53,590.64
US - New Mexico 76.18 1,969,915 38,670.70
US - New York 1,103.02 19,297,729 57,158.23
US - North Carolina 399.45 9,061,032 44,083.94
US - North Dakota 27.73 639,715 43,339.61
US - Ohio 466.31 11,466,917 40,665.59
US - Oklahoma 139.32 3,617,316 38,515.57
US - Oregon 158.23 3,747,455 42,224.12
US - Pennsylvania 531.11 12,432,792 42,718.48
US - Rhode Island 46.90 1,057,832 44,335.96
US - South Carolina 152.83 4,407,709 34,673.34
US - South Dakota 33.93 796,214 42,619.20
US - Tennessee 243.87 6,156,719 39,610.22
US - Texas 1,141.97 23,904,380 47,772.21
US - Utah 105.57 2,645,330 39,907.31
US - Vermont 24.54 621,254 39,505.58
US - Virginia 382.96 7,712,091 49,657.61
US - Washington 311.27 6,468,424 48,121.46
US - West Virginia 57.71 1,812,035 31,848.72
US - Wisconsin 232.29 5,601,640 41,468.75
US - Wyoming 31.51 522,830 60,275.81
European Union - All 14,430.00 490,426,060 29,423.40
EU - Austria 322.00 8,199,783 39,269.33
EU - Belgium 376.50 10,392,226 36,229.00
EU - Bulgaria (*) 86.71 7,322,858 11,841.01
EU - Cyprus 21.40 788,457 27,141.62
EU - Czech Republic (*) 251.00 10,228,744 24,538.69
EU - Denmark 203.30 5,468,120 37,179.14
EU - Estonia (*) 28.69 1,315,912 21,802.37
EU - Finland 188.40 5,238,460 35,964.77
EU - France 2,075.00 63,718,187 32,565.27
EU - Germany 2,807.00 82,400,996 34,065.12
EU - Greece 327.60 10,706,290 30,598.83
EU - Hungary 191.70 9,956,108 19,254.51
EU - Ireland 191.60 4,109,086 46,628.37
EU - Italy 1,800.00 58,147,733 30,955.64
EU - Latvia (*) 40.05 2,259,810 17,722.73
EU - Lithuania (*) 59.98 3,575,439 16,775.56
EU - Luxembourg 38.14 480,222 79,421.60
EU - Malta 9.40 401,880 23,390.07
EU - Netherlands 645.50 16,570,613 38,954.50
EU - Poland 623.10 38,518,241 16,176.75
EU - Portugal 232.30 10,642,836 21,826.89
EU - Romania (*) 247.10 22,276,056 11,092.63
EU - Slovakia 110.20 5,447,502 20,229.46
EU - Slovenia 56.19 2,009,245 27,965.73
EU - Spain 1,361.00 40,448,191 33,647.98
EU - Sweden 338.50 9,031,088 37,481.64
EU - United Kingdom 2,130.00 60,776,238 35,046.59

Sources and Acknowledgements:

The GDP and population data for the United States as a whole, as well as for the European Union as a whole, was obtained by adding up the state and national values we found for each. GDP-PPP per capita was found by dividing each region's 2007 GDP figure by its population estimate as of July 1, 2007.

We will note that the CIA's estimate of GDP-PPP for some European nations for 2007 is really different from what they indicated for 2006. For instance, nations such as Greece, the Netherlands and Spain would have effectively seen their GDP-PPP per Capita grow by more than 20%, even though the CIA also indicates that economic growth in these nations has been growing at comparatively moderate rates.

We wondered if that might be an effect of the relative valuations of the U.S. dollar with respect to the Euro, but we would then expect nations like France and Germany to also have similarly high levels of year-over-year GDP-PPP per Capita growth, but that's just not the case - their year over year growth is in the single digits.

So, we just might have a mystery! We don't know why the 2007 GDP-PPP for these nations is so different from what it was in 2006.

A Cage Match Contest

Since this kind of ranking invariably draws commentary from other quarters of the blogosphere, we thought it might be fun to try an experiment - why not have an open contest for the blog that can best explain why the data is the way that it is?

For our part, we'll be happy to link to, and possibly excerpt analysis from, the blogs that drive the most traffic to this post (in other words, you don't need to e-mail us to enter - you just need to link to us from your post that proposes a solution to this mystery!) We'll reserve a place of honor for the blogger who offers the most compelling analysis.

If it helps make that analysis easier, we've shaded the original EU-15 nations in light purple, while the twelve additional nations that have joined the EU in more recent years are shaded in light green.

What's more, we've also identified the nations in the EU with flat income taxes with asterisks (*). Those nations averaged 12.2% year over year growth in their GDP-PPP per capita.

And that's where we'll leave the rest to you! We'll look forward to what you come up with!

Previously on Political Calculations

2006 Economic and Population Data

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

Labels:

- posted by Ironman at 3:31 PM | Permalink | Home |
16 August 2007
Africa GDP Rankings for 2006

Political Map of Africa, 2006 It was only last year since we looked at the GDP of countries around the world, but since we did, two years worth of GDP data have been released. So, for the sake of getting caught up, we're skipping 2005 altogether and going straight to 2006!

We'll beginning our annual series of GDP comparisons around the world in Africa, providing a dynamic ranking table to show each of the continent's countries' Gross Domestic Product (GDP) adjusted for Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), their population and GDP-PPP per Capita for 2006. This year however, we're going to go the extra mile and determine each country's annualized rate of growth of their GDP-PPP per capita since 2004.

But before we go further, we should note that all GDP-PPP and GDP-PPP per Capita data is presented in U.S. dollars and is not adjusted for inflation. For example, for those of you watching the deterioration of Zimbabwe's economy, you won't find the negative effects of the country's hyperinflation of its own currency in these figures from 2006.

As we noted, the table below is dynamic - clicking any of the column headings will sort the data in the table from low to high value or from high to low (by clicking a column heading a second time.) To restore the original order, you'll need to refresh the page in your web browser.

Africa GDP-PPP in 2006
Country Population GDP-PPP GDP-PPP per Capita Pop. Est. Date GDP Est. Date % Change GDP-PPP per Capita, Since 2004
Algeria 32,930,091 250,000,000,000 7,591.84 July 2006 2006 7.2%
Angola 12,127,071 53,060,000,000 4,375.34 July 2006 2006 44.0%
Benin 7,862,944 8,989,000,000 1,143.21 July 2006 2006 -0.3%
Botswana 1,639,833 17,940,000,000 10,940.14 July 2006 2006 6.6%
Burkina Faso 13,902,972 18,760,000,000 1,349.35 July 2006 2006 7.9%
Burundi 8,090,068 5,781,000,000 714.58 July 2006 2006 5.5%
Cameroon 17,340,702 42,480,000,000 2,449.73 July 2006 2006 14.2%
Cape Verde 420,979 3,129,000,000 7,432.67 July 2006 2006 126.8%
Central African Republic 4,303,356 4,998,000,000 1,161.42 July 2006 2006 1.2%
Chad 9,944,201 14,980,000,000 1,506.41 July 2006 2006 -4.2%
Comoros 690,948 441,000,000 638.25 July 2006 2002 -2.8%
Congo, Democratic Republic of the 62,660,551 44,440,000,000 709.22 July 2006 2006 -1.6%
Congo, Republic of the 3,702,314 5,099,000,000 1,377.25 July 2006 2006 33.3%
Cote d'Ivoire 17,654,843 29,050,000,000 1,645.44 July 2006 2006 7.3%
Djibouti 486,530 619,000,000 1,272.28 July 2006 2002 -2.0%
Egypt 78,887,007 334,400,000,000 4,238.97 July 2006 2006 1.0%
Equatorial Guinea 540,109 25,690,000,000 47,564.47 July 2006 2005 342.6%
Eritrea 4,786,994 4,471,000,000 933.99 July 2006 2005 0.0%
Ethiopia 74,777,981 74,880,000,000 1,001.36 July 2006 2006 11.3%
Gabon 1,424,906 10,170,000,000 7,137.31 July 2006 2006 10.2%
Gambia, The 1,641,564 3,284,000,000 2,000.53 July 2006 2006 5.2%
Ghana 22,409,572 60,000,000,000 2,677.43 July 2006 2006 7.3%
Guinea 9,690,222 20,160,000,000 2,080.45 July 2006 2006 -0.7%
Guinea-Bissau 1,442,029 1,249,000,000 866.14 July 2006 2006 9.2%
Kenya 34,707,817 41,360,000,000 1,191.66 July 2006 2006 4.9%
Lesotho 2,022,331 5,327,000,000 2,634.09 July 2006 2006 -8.7%
Liberia 3,042,004 2,821,000,000 927.35 July 2006 2006 4.1%
Libya 5,900,754 72,680,000,000 12,317.07 July 2006 2006 36.0%
Madagascar 18,595,469 17,270,000,000 928.72 July 2006 2006 5.7%
Malawi 13,013,926 8,272,000,000 635.63 July 2006 2006 1.1%
Mali 11,716,829 14,770,000,000 1,260.58 July 2006 2006 17.1%
Mauritania 3,177,388 8,124,000,000 2,556.82 July 2006 2006 17.7%
Mauritius 1,240,827 17,000,000,000 13,700.54 July 2006 2006 3.3%
Mayotte 201,234 953,600,000 4,738.76 July 2006 2005 37.4%
Morocco 33,241,259 152,500,000,000 4,587.67 July 2006 2006 4.8%
Mozambique 19,686,505 29,170,000,000 1,481.73 July 2006 2006 9.2%
Namibia 2,044,147 15,440,000,000 7,553.27 July 2006 2006 0.0%
Niger 12,525,094 12,360,000,000 986.82 July 2006 2006 7.4%
Nigeria 131,859,731 191,400,000,000 1,451.54 July 2006 2006 25.9%
Rwanda 8,648,248 13,700,000,000 1,584.14 July 2006 2006 9.9%
Sao Tome and Principe 193,413 214,000,000 1,106.44 July 2006 2003 -3.1%
Senegal 11,987,121 21,540,000,000 1,796.93 July 2006 2006 3.1%
Sierra Leone 6,005,250 5,452,000,000 907.87 July 2006 2006 26.5%
Somalia 8,863,338 5,259,000,000 593.34 July 2006 2006 3.5%
South Africa 44,187,637 587,500,000,000 13,295.57 July 2006 2006 7.5%
Sudan 41,236,378 97,470,000,000 2,363.69 July 2006 2006 10.2%
Swaziland 1,136,334 5,936,000,000 5,223.82 July 2006 2006 0.7%
Tanzania 37,445,392 29,620,000,000 791.02 July 2006 2006 10.5%
Togo 5,548,702 9,271,000,000 1,670.84 July 2006 2006 3.4%
Tunisia 10,175,014 89,740,000,000 8,819.64 July 2006 2006 11.4%
Uganda 28,195,754 52,930,000,000 1,877.23 July 2006 2006 12.2%
Zambia 11,502,010 11,640,000,000 1,012.00 July 2006 2006 6.1%
Zimbabwe 12,236,805 25,360,000,000 2,072.44 July 2006 2006 3.8%
Africa (All) 910,142,549 2,581,043,600,000 2,835.87 July 2006 2006 8.8%

The Most Amazing Story in Africa

In 2004, Equitorial Guinea was just a bit ahead of the middle of the pack in terms of economic output in Africa. By 2006, GDP-PPP per capita in the small nation had soared past all the other continents countries and even past the United States $43,994.82 GDP-PPP per capita figure, as the nation's economic output skyrocketed at a blistering 342% compound annualized rate of growth.

So, how did a nation that most Americans are likely unfamiliar achieve this feat? In one word: oil. With large untapped oil fields just discovered in 1996, the combination of greatly increased oil production within the country and significant increases in worldwide demand (and prices) for the resource has brought enormous wealth to the tiny country.

With much of this explosive growth so new, we believe that Equatorial Guinea will be very interesting to watch as its population begins absorbing this wealth and the country adjusts to its new condition of being, on paper, one of the wealthiest nations in the world.

Sources and Acknowledgements:

Previously on Political Calculations

2004 Economic and Population Data

2002 Economic and Population Data

Labels: ,

- posted by Ironman at 9:27 AM | Permalink | Home |

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