Economy

Global

Economic trends that provide information and resources globally, domestically, and within the field of corrections.

2018 and newer

This white paper series, composed of eight parts, explores numerous critical topics related to CBDC and stablecoins, including an evaluation of their value proposition for the under-served, identification of key policy and regulatory actions, and discussion of salient technology considerations and trade-offs.

It aims to inform policy-makers, digital currency issuers, financial and civil society organizations, and other stakeholders as to the capabilities, risks, policy imperatives and key technology choices with respect to rapidly evolving stablecoins and CBDC.

Digital Currency Governance Consortium White Paper Series

Publisher: World Economic Forum

Publication Date: 11/1/2021

The global economic recovery is continuing, even as the pandemic resurges. The fault lines opened up by COVID-19 are looking more persistent—near-term divergences are expected to leave lasting imprints on medium-term performance. Vaccine access and early policy support are the principal drivers of the gaps.

Recovery during a Pandemic—Health Concerns, Supply Disruptions, Price Pressures

Author(s): International Monetary Fund

Publisher: World Economic Outlook

Publication Date: 10/1/2021

This quarterly briefing builds on the latest policy research as well as consultations and surveys with leading chief economists from both the public and private sectors, organized by the World Economic Forum’s Centre for the New Economy and Society. It aims to summarize the emerging contours of the current economic environment and identify priorities for further action by policy-makers and business leaders in response to the global economic crisis triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Global Economic Prospects, January 2021

Author(s): World Bank Group

Publication Date: 1/1/2021

The approval of several COVID-19 vaccines in late 2020 has brightened public health and economic prospects for 2021. Yet, prior to the onset of the pandemic, the global economy already had a fragile growth outlook, with social tensions over the evident polarization of economic outcomes and high levels of uncertainty. At this critical juncture, policymakers need to look beyond reviving the old economy and instead shift towards a thriving global economy—where growth is revived, social justice more fully realized, and the climate crisis averted.

Chief Economists Outlook 2021

Publisher: World Economic Forum

Publication Date: 1/1/2021

Innovations in technology are driving rapid development of new forms of money. The way global leaders from public and private sectors develop, coordinate and regulate such digital currencies will have profound implications on society’s capacity to harness their benefits and avoid the potentially significant risks they introduce. Two distinct forms of digital currency – central bank digital currency (CBDC) and “stablecoins” – have caught the attention of policy-makers and the private sector in recent years.

Digital Currency Governance Consortium, White Paper Series

Author(s): World Economic Forum

Publication Date: 11/1/2021

A once-in-a-century crisis—a Great Disruption unleashed by a viral pandemic—hit the world economy in 2020. In a matter of months, the number of people living in poverty increased sharply, while income and wealth inequality trended towards new highs. Governments around the world responded rapidly—and boldly—to stem the health and economic contagion of the crisis. Fiscal and monetary stimulus packages were quickly rolled out to save the economy. The crisis responses, however, entailed difficult choices between saving lives and saving livelihoods, between speed of delivery and efficiency, and between short-term costs and long-term impacts.

2021 has been a year of economic recovery, as the world slowly transitions to a state of (relative) normalcy. But some companies are rebounding faster than others. According to Kantar BrandZTM , a lot of it has to do with the strength of a company's brand. With this in mind, here's a look at the world's most valuable brands in 2021.

The World's 100 Most Valuable Brands in 2021

Author(s): Carmen Ang

Publisher: Visual Capitalist

Publication Date: 10/6/2021

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/most-valuable-brands-2021.html

Congress tasked BJS and the U.S. Census Bureau with reporting on post-prison employment of persons released from federal prison. The study population in this report includes 51,500 persons released from the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) whose release records could be linked by the U.S. Census Bureau to employment and wage files from the Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) program.

Employment of Persons Released from Federal Prison in 2010

Author(s): U.S. Department of Justice

Publication Date: 12/1/2021

https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/eprfp10.pdf

From arrest to incarceration and reentry, people who come into contact with the justice system are confronted with numerous financial challenges, including financial products and services that too often contain exploitative terms and features, offer little or no consumer choice, and can have long-term negative consequences for the individuals and families affected. This report outlines some of the challenges faced by justice-involved people and their families in navigating their finances at each stage of the criminal justice system.

This report presents data on state government finances collected from the 2020 Annual Survey of State Government Finances.

Annual Survey of State Government Finances Summary: 2020

Author(s): Deirdre Baker, Justin Keller, Raemeka Mayo, and Kristina Marie Pasquino Frates

Publisher: U.S. Census Bureau

Publication Date: 12/1/2021

https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2020/econ/g20-asfin.pdf

Each year, the Congressional Budget Office publishes a report presenting its projections of what federal debt, deficits, spending, and revenues would be for the next 30 years if current laws governing taxes and spending generally did not change. This report is the latest in the series.

The 2021 Long-Term Budget Outlook

Author(s): Molly Dahl, et. al

Publisher: Congressional Budget Office

Publication Date: 3/1/2021

https://www.cbo.gov/publication/57038

Nontraditional, short-term and contract work existed prior to the internet and smartphones, but the gig economy has ushered in a new way of connecting people with consumers and those who want to hire them. Indeed, the emergence of companies like Uber, TaskRabbit or DoorDash has expanded the way people earn money and added another dimension to the labor force.

The Congressional Budget Office’s transparency efforts are intended to promote a thorough understanding of its work, help people gauge how estimates might change if policies or circumstances differed, and enhance the credibility of its analyses and processes. This report fulfills CBO’s requirement to report on its plans for such efforts.

Transparency at CBO: Future Plans and a Review of 2021

Author(s): Lara Robillard and Congressional Budget Office

Publication Date: 3/1/2022

https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2022-03/57701-Transparency.pdf

Global prospects remain highly uncertain one year into the pandemic. New virus mutations and the accumulating human toll raise concerns, even as growing vaccine coverage lifts sentiment. Economic recoveries are diverging across countries and sectors, reflecting variation in pandemic-induced disruptions and the extent of policy support. The outlook depends not just on the outcome of the battle between the virus and vaccines—it also hinges on how effectively economic policies deployed under high uncertainty can limit lasting damage from this unprecedented crisis.Global growth is projected at 6 percent in 2021, moderating to 4.4 percent in 2022. The projections for 2021 and 2022 are stronger than in the October 2020 WEO.

In this Fifth Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, the Commission seeks to obtain detailed comment to enable it to make further progress toward ensuring that the rates, charges, and practices for and in connection with interstate and international inmate calling services meet applicable statutory standards.

Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services

 

Publisher: Federal Communications Commission

Volume, Issue, & Page: Vol. 86, No. 142

Publication Date: 7/28/2021

Rates for Interstate Inmate Calling Services

Economic prospects have diverged further across countries since the April 2021 World Economic Outlook (WEO) forecast. Vaccine access has emerged as the principal fault line along which the global recovery splits into two blocs: those that can look forward to further normalization of activity later this year (almost all advanced economies) and those that will still face resurgent infections and rising COVID death tolls. The recovery, however, is not assured even in countries where infections are currently very low so long as the virus circulates elsewhere.

Fault Lines Widen in the Global Recovery

Author(s): International Monetary Fund

Publisher: World Economic Outlook

Publication Date: 07/2021

Financial stability risks have been contained so far, reflecting ongoing policy support and a rebound in the global economy earlier this year. However, the optimism that propelled markets earlier in the year has faded on growing concerns about the strength of the global recovery, and ongoing supply chain disruptions intensified inflation concerns. Signs of stretched asset valuations in some market segments persist, and pockets of vulnerabilities remain in the nonbank financial sector; recovery is uneven in the corporate sector.

Global Financial Stability Report, Covid-19, Crypto, and Climate

Author(s): International Monetary Fund

Publisher: Global Financial Stability Report

CBO presents its projections of what federal deficits, debt, spending, and revenues would be for the next 30 years if current laws governing taxes and spending generally did not change.

In this document, the Commission continues to comprehensively reform inmate calling services rates to ensure just and reasonable rates for interstate and international inmate calling services. Specifically, the Commission proposes to lower the current interstate rate caps to $0.14 per minute for debit, prepaid, and collect calls from prisons and $0.16 per minute for debit, prepaid, and collect calls from jails. The Commission also proposes to cap rates for international inmate calling services, which remain uncapped today.

The high cost of calling home from prisons and jails gets a lot of attention in the press, but the industry’s practice of tacking on hidden fees is getting an increasing amount of attention from regulators and the savviest correctional facilities. These fees can be called by a variety of different names and can add up to significant costs to the families of people in prison. The problem got so bad that the companies were potentially making more from fees than from selling their product — phone calls.

Visualizing the Top 50 Most Valuable Global Brands

For many brands, it has been a devastating year to say the least.

Over half of the most valuable global brands have experienced a decline in brand value, a measure that takes financial projections, brand roles in purchase decisions, and strengths against competitors into consideration. But where some have faltered, others have asserted their dominance and stepped up for their customers like never before.

 

Near-term global financial stability risks have been contained as an unprecedented policy response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has helped avert a financial meltdown and maintain the flow of credit to the economy. For the first time, many emerging market central banks have launched asset purchase programs to support the smooth functioning of financial markets and the overall economy. But the outlook remains highly uncertain, and vulnerabilities are rising, representing potential headwinds to recovery. The report presents an assessment of the real-financial disconnect, as well as forward-looking analysis of nonfinancial firms, banks, and emerging market capital flows. After the outbreak, firms’ cash flows were adversely affected as economic activity declined sharply.

Following its weakest performance since the global financial crisis, the world economy is poised for a modest rebound this year– if everything goes just right.

Hanging over this lethargic recovery are two other trends that raise questions about the course of economic growth: the unprecedented runup in debt worldwide, and the prolonged deceleration of productivity growth, which needs to pick up to bolster standards of living and poverty eradication.

Global growth is set to rise by 2.5% this year, a small uptick from 2.4% in 2019, as trade and investment gradually recover, the World Bank’s semi-annual Global Economic Prospects forecasts. Advanced economies are expected to slow as a group to 1.4% from 1.6%, mainly reflecting lingering weakness in manufacturing. 

The Global Competitiveness Report series has since its first edition aimed to prompt policy-makers beyond short term growth and to aim for long-run prosperity. The 2020 special edition is dedicated to elaborating on the priorities for recovery and revival, and considering the building blocks of a transformation towards new economic systems that combine “productivity”, “people” and “planet” targets.