As the annual World Economic Forum gets under way, we bring you five key datasets to help understand the issues – from widening income inequality and weak economic growth to persistently high unemployment, unsustainable government debt and CO2 emissions
More than 2,500 heads of state, policymakers, economists, chief executives and assorted billionaires and activists are gathering in the Swiss Alpine resort of Davos for the 44th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum.
The theme of this year's four-day pow-wow is The Reshaping of the World: Consequences for Society, Politics and Business – with inequality and the huge impact of technological change key discussion points.
British prime minister David Cameron and Japan's Shinzo Abe will be among 40 national leaders attending. Germany will be represented by foreign minister Wolfgang Schäuble after chencellor Angela Merkel was injured in a skiing accident.
Business attendees include Goldman Sachs boss Lloyd Blankfein and Barclays chief Antony Jenkins, while the roll call of central bankers boasts Bank of England governor Mark Carney and ECB boss Mario Draghi.
Matt Damon, Bono and Margeret Atwood will also be there. You can see the full list of attendees here.
1: InequalityThe growing gap between rich and poor was the biggest threat to global prosperity identified by the World Economic Forum's members in this year's survey.
In the words of the WEF's founder and chairman, Klaus Schwab: "The slowdown is taking place against the backdrop of rising economic inequality, owing to the declining share of national income going to labour, a worldwide phenomenon – resulting from globalisation and technological progress – that poses a serious challenge to policymakers. Systems that propagate inequality, or that seem unable to stem its rise, contain the seeds of their own destruction."
The map above shows inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient for the 34 OECD countries (Source: OECD) and the five Brics – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (Source: World Bank). The higher the score, the more unequal the economy. A coefficient above 0.4 is generally regarded as the warning level for dangerous levels of inequality.
2: GDP growthThe worst economic slump since the 1930s has been followed by the weakest recovery on record. Five years after the financial crisis sparked recession, growth is still weak in many countries – and negative in others.
Guardian economics editor Larry Elliott says attention this year will focus on four issues: "Can the US "taper" away its QE stimulus without aborting its tepid recovery and triggering a fresh crisis in one of the "fragile five" emerging countries (India, Indonesia, South Africa, Turkey and Brazil)? Can China switch to a more liberalised model without a hard landing? Will the eurozone be able to avoid Japanese-style deflation? And will 2014 be the year when Japan emerges from two decades of slow growth and falling prices? Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, will give a keynote speech on 22 January, and insiders are expecting an optimistic tone following signs that his stimulus package is working."
The line chart above shows annual GDP growth rates from 2007 to 2012 for selected OECD and Brics countries. Fuller World Bank data is available in the table below.
3: UnemploymentUnemployment is at near record levels of 12.1% in the eurozone – with around a quarter of the working-age population out of a job in Spain and Greece. Youth unemployment is much higher.
"Can a crisis really be over when 12% of the labour force is without a job," asked IMF managing director Christine Lagarde last month. "When unemployment among the youth is in very high double digits, reaching more than 50% in Greece and Spain? And when there is no sign that it is becoming easier for people to pay down their debts?"
4: Government debtPricewaterhouseCoopers' annual survey of chief executives found that the ability of debt-laden governments to rein in their deficits was cited as a concern by 71% of those surveyed – up from 61% in 2011.
The chart above shows government debt as a percentage of GDP for selected countries.
5: Climate change and CO2 emissionsThe WEF is also concerned that governments are so caught up with trying to deal with economic problems that they were not properly addressing the long-term threat of climate change.
The map above shows CO2 emissions per capita in metric tonnes for the platest available year, from the World Bank.
Data summary.
DavosDavos 2014EconomicsGlobal economyNick Meadtheguardian.com © 2014 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds |
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