The Philippines Seen to be among World’s Top 20 Economies by 2050

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), a global professional services network with offices in 157 countries around the world, sees the Philippines as among the Top 20 economies worldwide by the year 2050. This is a “mere” 33 years into the future. The forecast is contained in a study published February 2017 and entitled “The Long View: How will the global economic order change by 2050?¹”

The study projects gross domestic product (GDP) through to the year 2050 for 32 of the world’s largest economies. These countries account for 85% of the entire world’s GDP. In order to arrive at its conclusions, the study used a “long term economic growth model” and took into account “projected trends in demographics, capital investment, education levels and technological progress.”

The modeling forecasts were complemented by a) opinions of five emerging markets (China, Nigeria, Colombia, Turkey and Poland) from senior partners of PwC senior economists in these countries; b) interviews with leading academics on the uncertainties regarding the modeling projections, the challenge of income inequality, the need for institutional reform and the implications of the study for business strategy; and c) summaries of other relevant PwC researches.

Some of the study’s key findings are summarized below, quoted verbatim from the PwC document:

1. That the world economy could more than double in size by 2050, assuming broadly growth-friendly.
2. Emerging markets will continue to be the growth engine of the global economy. By 2050, the E7² economies could have increased their share of world GDP from around 35% to almost 50%. China could be the largest economy in the world, accounting for around 20% of world GDP in 2050, with India in second place and Indonesia in fourth place (based on GDP at PPPs³).
3. A number of other emerging markets will also take center stage – Mexico could be larger than the UK and Germany by 2050 in PPP terms and six of the seven largest economies in the world could be emerging markets by that time.
4. Vietnam, India and Bangladesh are forecast to be three of the world’s fastest growing economies over this period.
5. Today’s advanced economies will continue to have higher average incomes, but emerging economies should make good progress towards closing this gap by 2050.

In 2016, the Philippines were estimated to have had a GDP at PPP of US$ 802 billion, good for 28th place among the top 32 economies in the world. This is ahead of Vietnam (US$ 595B) but behind Malaysia (US$ 864B), Thailand (US$ 1.162 trillion) and Indonesia (US$ 3.028T) in Southeast Asia.

By 2030, incidentally less than 13 years from now, the Philippines are expected to rise four places to 24, with GDP at PPP of US$ 1.615T, ahead of Vietnam (US$ 1.303T) and Malaysia (US$ 1.506T) but behind Thailand (US$ 1.732T) and Indonesia (US$ 5.424T) in Southeast Asia.

By 2050, which is less than 33 years from the present, the Philippines are expected to break into the Top 20 world economies at number 19 with GDP at PPP of US$ 3.334T. The country will still be behind Indonesia (US$ 10.502T) in Southeast Asia but ahead of Vietnam (US$ 3.176T), Malaysia (US$ 2.815T) and Thailand (US$ 2.782T).

The Philippines’ economy will also be bigger than that of Italy (US$ 3.115T), Canada (US$ 3.1T), its former colonial master Spain (US4 2.732T), South Africa (US$ 2.57T), Australia (US$ 2.564T), Argentina (US$ 2.365T), Poland (US$ 2.103T), Colombia (US$ 2.074T) and the Netherlands (US$ 1.496T).

Crucially, by 2050, the United States will have dropped to third behind China and India, while Japan will have dropped to eighth from fourth in 2016; Germany to ninth from fifth in 2016; the United Kingdom to tenth from ninth in 2016; and France to twelfth from tenth in 2016.

Below is the complete ranking of the top 32 world economies in 2016 and forecasts for the years 2030 and 2050.

Projected rankings of economies based on GDP at PPPs (in constant 2016 $bn)

GDP	2016 Rankings		2030 Rankings		2050 Rankings
	Country	GDP	Country	GDP	Country	GDP
1	China	21,269	China	38,008	China	58,499
2	USA	18,562	USA	23,475	India	44,128
3	India	8,721	India	19,511	USA	34,102
4	Japan	4,932	Japan	5,606	Indonesia	10,502
5	Germany	3,979	Indonesia	5,424	Brazil	7,540
6	Brazil	3,745	Russia	4,736	Russia	7,131
7	Russia	3,135	Germany	4,707	Mexico	6,863
8	Indonesia	3,028	Brazil	4,439	Japan	6,779
9	UK	2,788	Mexico	3,661	Germany	6,138
10	France	2,737	UK	3,638	UK	5,369
11	Mexico	2,307	France	3,377	Turkey	5,184
12	Italy	2,221	Turkey	2,996	France	4,705
13	S Korea	1,929	S Arabia	2,755	S Arabia	4,694
14	Turkey	1,906	S Korea	2,651	Nigeria	4,348
15	S Arabia	1,731	Italy	2,541	Egypt	4,333
16	Spain	1,690	Iran	2,354	Pakistan	4,236
17	Canada	1,674	Spain	2,159	Iran	3,900
18	Iran	1,459	Canada	2,141	S Korea	3,539
19	Australia	1,189	Egypt	2,049	Philippines	3,334
20	Thailand	1,161	Pakistan	1,868	Vietnam	3,176
21	Egypt	1,105	Nigeria	1,794	Italy	3,115
22	Nigeria	1,089	Thailand	1,732	Canada	3,100
23	Poland	1,052	Australia	1,663	Bangladesh	3,064
24	Pakistan	988	Philippines	1,615	Malaysia	2,815
25	Argentina	879	Malaysia	1,506	Thailand	2,782
26	Netherlands	866	Poland	1,505	Spain	2,732
27	Malaysia	864	Argentina	1,342	S Africa	2,570
28	Philippines	802	Bangladesh	1,324	Australia	2,564
29	South Africa	736	Vietnam	1,303	Argentina	2,365
30	Colombia	690	S Africa	1,148	Poland	2,103
31	Bangladesh	628	Colombia	1,111	Colombia	2,074
32	Vietnam	595	Netherlands	1,080	Netherlands	1,496

Notes and references:
¹ “The Long View: How will the global economic order change by 2050?” online at PwC.
² E7 refers to the emerging market economies of Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia and Turkey.
³ PPP means purchasing power parity, “a theory which states that exchange rates between currencies are in equilibrium when their purchasing power is the same in each of the two countries,” online at the Pacific Exchange Rate Service.

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