Is economic freedom needed for economic prosperity?
Pardon me for asking the obvious. But if less democratic countries manage to maintain high levels of HDI, maybe less economically free countries manage to reach high levels of GDP per capita? The answer is no, the relationship is clear and exponential – free economy is best. That might surprise, but even the United Arab Emirates are economically free, they rank the 9th in the world by economic freedom.
What: Average GDP per capita in USD in a given Economic Freedom Index range. The red area represents the standard deviation – with higher Index values, the GDP becomes more volatile.
When: I’d say the whole graph is 2018 because Economic Freedom Index represents previous years.
Where: 175 countries of the world.
Source: The Heritage Foundation and WB