GDP per capita (constant 2015 US$)

wdi.ny_gdp_pcap_kd · World Bank — World Development Indicators · NY.GDP.PCAP.KD

Understanding the indicator

How to read this indicator

Definition

Gross domestic product divided by midyear population, in constant 2015 US dollars (inflation removed). Measures the size of the economy per person.

Formula

Real GDP (2015 US$) / population.

Unit

2015 US$

License

CC-BY-4.0

This visualization is descriptive and does not show that a government caused the change. See the methodology.

Criticisms of the metric

• Does not measure welfare: ignores distribution, leisure, life expectancy and non-market production. Jones and Klenow (2016) show welfare rankings diverge substantially from GDP per capita rankings.
• In market-exchange-rate dollars, not purchasing power parity; cross-country level comparisons are distorted. Use for trends within a country.

What studies say

How to read studies: what each design can and cannot show

• Descriptive

  Jones and Klenow propose a welfare measure that combines consumption, leisure, mortality and inequality, and compute it for many countries. Welfare is highly correlated with GDP per capita, but deviations are often large: Western Europe looks much closer to the United States than by GDP, emerging Asia has caught up less, and many developing countries are further behind. Mortality is the component that weighs most in these differences. [doi:10.1257/aer.20110236]

• Observational

  In a review of the evidence, Sacks, Stevenson and Wolfers find that reported well-being rises with income whether people are compared within one country and year, countries are compared with each other, or economic growth is followed within a country: richer people report higher well-being, richer countries have higher average well-being, and economic growth and growth in well-being are clearly related. The data show no satiation point above which income and well-being stop being related. This conclusion seems to point in the opposite direction from the next study. [doi:10.1037/a0029873]

• Observational

  Easterlin and coauthors find that, over the long term (10 years or more), average happiness does not rise as a country's income grows, in developed, developing and post-socialist transition countries. In the short term, happiness and income move together: they fall in recessions and rise in expansions. The result is disputed; the authors argue the critiques result from a statistical artifact or from confusing the short term with the long term. [doi:10.1073/pnas.1015962107]

Studied policies

• Manaus Free Trade Zone · Brazil · 1967–1999

  ▲ Positive effect · Synthetic control · Level of evidence: Moderate

  Using synthetic control and data for municipal areas from 1920 to 1999, Possebom estimates that the Free Trade Zone had a significantly positive effect on real GDP per capita and services output per capita in the Manaus area, and a significantly negative effect on agricultural output per capita. The author concludes that the subsidy promoted regional growth at the cost of misallocating resources across sectors, and says there is not enough information for a cost-benefit analysis. [doi:10.5935/0034-7140.20170011]

• 1990–1994 trade liberalization: relative regional effects on earnings and formal employment · Brazil · 1990–1994

  ▼ Negative effect · Difference-in-differences · Level of evidence: Moderate

  Regions more exposed to import tariff cuts fared worse than less exposed ones; the study does not measure the effect of liberalization on the country as a whole. Comparing these regions before and after liberalization, Dix-Carneiro and Kovak find prolonged declines in formal employment and earnings in the more exposed regions relative to the others. The effect on regional earnings 20 years after liberalization was three times the effect after 10 years. [doi:10.1257/aer.20161214]

• German reunification (effect on West Germany) · DEU · 1990–2003

  ▼ Negative effect · Synthetic control · Level of evidence: Moderate

  Using synthetic control, Abadie, Diamond and Hainmueller compare West Germany with a combination of OECD countries that resembled it before 1990. They estimate that reunification reduced West German GDP per capita by about 1,600 US dollars per year on average over 1990–2003, approximately 8% of the 1990 baseline level. [doi:10.1111/ajps.12116]

• Economic liberalization (many countries) · World · 1963–2005

  ◆ Mixed result · Synthetic control · Level of evidence: Moderate

  Applying synthetic control to economic liberalization episodes worldwide, Billmeier and Nannicini find a positive effect on real GDP per capita in most regions, but no significant impact for more recent liberalizations, in the 1990s and mainly in Africa. [doi:10.1162/REST_a_00324]

By income bracket

• In Brazil, the Gini coefficient rose from 0.57 in 1981 to 0.63 in 1989 and fell to 0.56 in 2004; poverty incidence went from 0.30 in 1981 to 0.33 in 1993 and fell to 0.22 in 2004. Ferreira, Leite and Litchfield associate the decline in inequality since 1993 with declining inflation and, in their preliminary investigation, with four changes: declining returns to education, rural-urban convergence, larger social assistance transfers targeted to the poor, and a possible decline in racial inequality. They conclude that falling inequality contributed substantially to poverty reduction. It is a descriptive study, without a causal design. (1981–2004) [doi:10.1017/S1365100507070137]

• Comparing Brazil and the United States, Ferreira, Firpo and Galvao find that growth in average real wages was disappointing in both countries, but distributed very differently. In Brazil, wages grew rapidly below the median and fell at the top, and the share of total wages received by the bottom 65% rose. In the United States, growth was mediocre for the bottom 80% and much more rapid for the top 20%. The study is about wages, not the household income per capita used in the brackets below, so its groups are not translated into the brackets. (1995–2007) [doi:10.1002/jae.2663]

Purchasing power

The first chart corrects for cost-of-living differences between countries; the second uses exchange rates and does not.

Price level relative to the United States

Below 1, prices are lower than in the United States; above 1, higher. World Bank — World Development Indicators · wdi.pa_nus_prvt_pp · Source version 2026-10-08 · Collected on 2026-11-01 · World Bank — World Development Indicators · wdi.pa_nus_fcrf · Source version 2026-10-08 · Collected on 2026-11-01

Policies and impacts

1. Possebom, V. (2017). Free Trade Zone of Manaus: an impact evaluation using the synthetic control method. Revista Brasileira de Economia, 71(2). doi:10.5935/0034-7140.20170011
2. Dix-Carneiro, R., & Kovak, B. K. (2017). Trade liberalization and regional dynamics. American Economic Review, 107(10), 2908–2946. doi:10.1257/aer.20161214
3. Abadie, A., Diamond, A., & Hainmueller, J. (2014). Comparative politics and the synthetic control method. American Journal of Political Science, 59(2), 495–510. doi:10.1111/ajps.12116
4. Billmeier, A., & Nannicini, T. (2013). Assessing economic liberalization episodes: a synthetic control approach. Review of Economics and Statistics, 95(3), 983–1001. doi:10.1162/REST_a_00324
5. Ferreira, F. H. G., Leite, P. G., & Litchfield, J. A. (2008). The rise and fall of Brazilian inequality: 1981–2004. Macroeconomic Dynamics, 12(S2), 199–230. doi:10.1017/S1365100507070137
6. Ferreira, F. H. G., Firpo, S., & Galvao, A. F. (2018). Actual and counterfactual growth incidence and delta Lorenz curves: estimation and inference. Journal of Applied Econometrics, 34(3), 385–402. doi:10.1002/jae.2663

About the indicator

1. Jones, C. I., & Klenow, P. J. (2016). Beyond GDP? Welfare across countries and time. American Economic Review, 106(9), 2426–2457. doi:10.1257/aer.20110236

1. Jones, C. I., & Klenow, P. J. (2016). Beyond GDP? Welfare across countries and time. American Economic Review, 106(9), 2426–2457. doi:10.1257/aer.20110236
2. Sacks, D. W., Stevenson, B., & Wolfers, J. (2012). The new stylized facts about income and subjective well-being. Emotion, 12(6), 1181–1187. doi:10.1037/a0029873
3. Easterlin, R. A., McVey, L. A., Switek, M., Sawangfa, O., & Zweig, J. S. (2010). The happiness–income paradox revisited. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 107(52), 22463–22468. doi:10.1073/pnas.1015962107

Download data (CSV)

Where each number comes from