The World's Most Competitive Economies

This year’s World Competitiveness Ranking, published by the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) evaluates 64 economies based on more than 300 indicators across four broad categories: economic performance, government efficiency, business efficiency and infrastructure. The indicators are a mix of hard data, which accounts for two thirds of the final ranking, and survey results, which account for the remaining third of the results.

As the following chart shows, the ranking covers large parts of Europe as well as North America, while leaving some white spots in South America, Asia and, most notably, Africa with just two African economies evaluated this year. As in previous years, Europe dominates the competitiveness ranking with European economies in the top 10, including all three top spots.

While Asia also has three economies in the top 10, its largest economies China, India, Japan and South Korea are notably absent. Instead it’s Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong who reach the highest scores in the region.