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The Graphic Truth: Which G7 economies are rebounding?
G7 nations – the US, UK, Germany, France, Italy, Japan, and Canada – are among the wealthiest economies in the world, but that doesn’t mean they have been insulated from economic disruptions over the past two decades.
When it comes to GDP per capita – which reflects a country’s economic performance relative to its population size and levels of productivity – the US rises well above other G7 states. This is largely because the US economy is more dynamic and more open to risk. Consider that the US has the most unicorn startups in the world – and by a long shot. It has also sought to revitalize cities in the South and West, giving a further boost to overall productivity. This breadth also makes the US economy more resilient, helping it recover faster when economic downturns – caused by a pandemic and war in Europe – ripple through the global economy.
When it comes to overall economic growth, however, Canada is expected to come in first place in 2024, in part due to a strong labor market that recovered quickly post-pandemic.
We look at how GDP per capita among G7 nations has changed since the turn of the century and give a snapshot of projected growth in these countries in 2024.
Line Graphs of the number of migrants accepted into various EU countries
Migration to Europe has been climbing over the last two decades, with migrants largely coming from the Middle East, North Africa, and – since 2022 – Ukraine. While some EU countries have opened their arms to migrants, others have erected fences and closed borders. We take a look at how the number of migrants EU countries have accepted in recent years.
State Farm, the largest homeowner insurance company in California, recently announced that it’s halting new insurance sales across the Golden State. This is part of a nationwide trend of insurers raising rates, restricting coverage, or pulling out of areas altogether. Why? Because they’re tired of losing money to natural disasters.
In the 1980s, for example, the US averaged three or four annual disasters with costs in the billions. But those numbers started to tick up significantly after 2010, and in 2021, 18 disasters cost $175.2 billion in damages.
Increasingly frequent natural disasters, in turn, are wreaking havoc on the insurance market and turning it into a system where, in some places, only the most affluent will be able to afford coverage. In 2021, FEMA, which had provided taxpayer-backed flood insurance nationwide, had to start setting rates equal to the flood risk. This change caused the average cost of flood insurance to jump from $888 a year to $1,808, with prices being exponentially higher for those in flood zones.
Florida is on the verge of an insurance crisis thanks to consecutive years of bad storms. Twelve private insurers in Florida have gone out of business since 2020, six in the last year alone, and 30 more are being monitored by state regulators over their risk of insolvency. Meanwhile, severe storms in the Midwest, droughts and wildfires in the Southwest, and flooding in Kentucky and Missouri have priced hundreds of thousands out of the system in the last year alone.
In Louisiana, the insurance market has been buckling since 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. After the last few years of bad storms, the state government has had to borrow $600 million to prop up insurers and rescue homeowners who have been abandoned by the broken system.
The lack of insurance makes extreme weather events even more costly. It slows economic recovery, increases the likelihood of cascading financial consequences, and can leave people in financial ruin, especially in low-income communities, which are increasingly being left at the mercy of Mother Nature as natural disasters become more intense.
Many of these vulnerable communities are being blue-lined, whereby banks or mortgage lenders designate neighborhoods that are more susceptible to climate risk and have less access to affordable insurance premiums.
Earlier in 2023, the Biden administration released a report detailing the economic challenges a warming planet posed to the US. It argued that bailing out homeowners after natural disasters incentivizes them to reside in riskier areas, increasing costs on taxpayers and slowing down climate change adaptation.
While the report is not legislation, it identifies how climate change has upended the nature of risk across the American economy and how the federal government will bear significantly higher costs in the future if it does not correct where it is creating market distortions. Two examples of distortions: paying more for healthcare for victims of heat stroke and paying to rebuild coastal homes flooded by hurricanes.
The government wants climate change risk factored into Americans’ decisions, and insurance companies want it factored into their prices. But inevitably, those paying the biggest price will be low-income Americans with fewer resources to relocate.
Voter intention for Taiwan's presidential poll in 2024.
Taiwan goes to the polls in January 2024 in what is likely the most consequential presidential election since the self-ruled island embraced democracy in 1996. As usual, the vote will be all about ... China.
Looking to replace term-limited President Tsai Ing-wen are VP William Lai, from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, and Hou Yu-ih, a former top cop nominated by the opposition Kuomintang Party. The DPP and the KMT have always dominated Taiwanese politics, with the former taking a tougher line on relations with the mainland. But this time a third-party candidate wants to give them a run for their money.
Enter Ko Wen-je, a two-time former mayor of the capital, Taipei, who's running on the first-ever presidential ticket of the upstart Taiwan People's Party. Ko — who sometimes expresses himself awkwardly because he has Asperger’s syndrome — has been grabbing headlines after recently placing second in the presidential polls ahead of Hou.
Ko is gaining traction thanks to his popularity with young voters fed up with the establishment parties, says Eurasia Group analyst Ava Shen. But he also has many detractors.
"To those who support him, Ko is a much-needed third force that could alter the polarized landscape in Taiwanese politics," Shen explains. "To those who are critical of him, Ko is an inexperienced politician with controversial gaffes and an unclear platform, unfit for national government."
Still, the TPP candidate offers something different to voters: Ko doesn't bang people over the head about relations with China, preferring to focus on domestic issues such as energy and housing — as if he were running for local office instead of the presidency.
When he does talk about how he'd deal with Xi Jinping, Ko styles himself as a pragmatist who will neither provoke China like the DPP nor defer to it like the KMT. Yet, his enemies see the TPP presidential hopeful as a tad closer to KMT appeasement, fueling speculation that Ko might be a Manchurian Candidate.
Shen doesn’t buy it. “Beijing still prefers Hou and the KMT to win; it is not yet clear how Beijing feels about Ko and the TPP,” she says. “Nevertheless, Ko's position on cross-strait relations appears to be more moderate than Lai’s — which could appeal to China.”
Whether or not Ko is cozier with Xi than he lets on, he faces long odds of winning Taiwan's presidency, since the TPP lacks an established voter base. What's more, KMT supporters are putting pressure on Ko to become Hou's running mate and consolidate the anti-DPP vote.
So far, though, the TPP hopeful says he's in the race to win it. But if by doing so he ends up handing the election to Lai, Beijing will not be pleased.