World Economy

This paper presents long-run economic projections for 46 countries, extending the short-run projections of the Spring 2018 OECD Economic Outlook. It first sets out a baseline scenario under the assumption that countries do not carry out institutional and policy reforms. This scenario is then used as a reference point to illustrate the potential impact of structural reforms in alternative scenarios, including better governance and educational attainment in the large emerging-market economies and competition-friendly product market and labour market reforms in OECD economies. Flexibility-enhancing labour market reforms not only boost living standards but, by raising the employment rate, also help alleviate fiscal pressures associated with population ageing. Another scenario illustrates the potential positive impact of linking the pensionable age to life expectancy on the participation rate of older workers, and in particular that of women. Additional scenarios illustrate the potential economic gains from raising public investment and spending more on research and development. A final ‘negative’ scenario shows how slipping back on trade liberalisation – returning to 1990 average tariff rates – might depress standards of living everywhere.

Strategic Global Outlook: 2030 is an interdisciplinary study prepared by the panel of experts with long experience of research in international, regional and country issues. The statistical database of the Outlook is based on predictive estimates of GDP, labor productivity, R&D investment and other indicators calculated using the original method developed in IMEMO RAN. “Outlook: 2030” offers an opportunity to focus attention on determined trends of world economy and international political order, on relevant entities, structures and institutions. Our major task was to explore risks and challenges that key global economic and political trends do represent to Russia.

"This paper provides a concise analysis of the potential impact of globalisation on regional income disparities in Europe and of the role of neighbouring countries in this process in the period up to 2020.
The analysis is part of a broader project of DG REGIO, which, together with the World Bank and the Bertelsmann Foundation, has established the Regional Future Initiative, a network of experts looking at the future of regional trends. The objective of the network is to analyse and build a consensus on the future impacts of key challenges (globalisation, climate change, demographic change and migration, energy risks and social polarisation) that regions will face in the perspective of 2020 and to elaborate and discuss possible responses. The output of the network should provide a basis for policy discussion and choices in the coming years.
The paper is based upon a new analysis produced by the Regional Future network itself as well as prior research by international institutions and scholars. The project covers 5 challenges and the discussion of each challenge has been designed to avoid overlaps so far as possible. In the final phase the analysis of each challenge will be merged to produce two broad scenarios for European regions in 2020.

(...) After a review of relevant literature and hypotheses, the paper proceeds to examine the characteristics and dimensions of globalization as it affects Europe and neighbouring regions. The analysis focusses on countries first and then on regions (NUTS2). At the country level, the scope of the analysis is wider and benefits from the extensive availability and reliability of national data. The more limited availability of data at the regional level narrows down the scope of the exercise but nevertheless allows us to point out peculiar geographical patterns which are particularly relevant to cohesion.
The country-level analysis of globalisation (§ 2.1-2.2) provides a basis for examining the strength of individual Member States in different branches of trade (manufactures, services, raw materials and energy etc.) and other external income sources. A set of indicators is then used to calculate an index of sensitivity of individual regions in the face of globalization opportunities and pressures (§ 2.3). Three groups of regions are identified on the basis of this index: highly beneficiary, intermediate and vulnerable regions.
The final chapter looks forward to 2020 and considers prospects for European countries under two different scenarios for the world economy and European economy as a whole (§ 3.1-2). Finally, by combining insights stemming from the country-level analysis and the index of regional sensitivity the paper assesses the potential impacts of globalisation on regions in 2020 (§ 3.3)".

The definition of the globalisation process is particularly difficult. Globalisation is not an unequivocally defined statistical variable which is directly measurable (like GDP and Trade) or indirectly computable (like Ageing and Migration), but rather the multifaceted synthesis of a vast number factors of different nature - economic, social, technological etc. – which are often difficult to find into current statistics. Beside, globalisation is a bundle of different dynamics, which means that it became quickly impossible to operate a clear cut distinction between its causes and effects.

One of the consequences of these complexities is that the measurement of globalisation and the notion of its impact are not universal, but vary accordingly to the specific interests of the analysis. In the context of our exercise, we look at globalisation as a process of international (market) integration, where local economies and social systems experience a rapid increase of their sphere of action and their reciprocal interdependence. According to this definition, globalization assumes the characters of a structural development of the economic system. Cyclical events, though with profound consequences as the recent financial and economic crisis, do not modify the pattern of the analysis since it is believed that their influence is temporary and will not change the
direction of long term trends.

A first way of sketching globalisation according to this definition is by measuring the evolution of the share of trade in GDP. In addition, the role of investments is of everincreasing importance, since companies have supplemented trade with investments and moved from geographically concentrated goods and services production networks to geographically disperse ones. The brief analysis presented in the next section attempts to offer an idea of "the openness boom" spreading around the world and the EU with its Member states.

Section 3 attempts to identify the main advantages and disadvantages of globalisation for EU stakeholders. Globalization gives the EU greater access to other countries' markets and resources, while granting other countries greater access to the EU, one of the largest and wealthiest markets in the world. Overall, this process has been mutually beneficial.

However, the benefits have not always been evenly distributed across the EU territory and economic sectors.

Considering that productivity, employment and education are the main elements which transform the challenge posed by globalisation into an opportunity, section 4 briefly presents the projected regional pattern of these variables for the 2020.

Finally, section 5 presents the main findings of the regional analysis carried out with the "globalisation vulnerability index". The index synthesises the overall position of the EU regions in respect of the variables analysed in section 4 and compares their different position vis-à-vis the challenges posed by the globalisation process.