Goal 8 - Decent work and economic growth

Global Competitiveness Index (GCI) is made up of 114 variables. These variables are grouped into 12 correlated with each other pillars (domains). These domains cover the most important determinants of competitiveness in the global market.

12 pillars were defined:

1st pillar: Institutions;
2nd pillar: Infrastructure;
3rd pillar: Macroeconomic environment;
4th pillar: Health and primary education;
5th pillar: Higher education and training;
6th pillar: Goods market efficiency;
7th pillar: Labour market efficiency;
8th pillar: Financial market development;
9th pillar: Technological readiness;
10th pillar: Market size;
11th pillar: Business sophistication;
12th pillar: R&D Innovation.

The level of GCI index includes connections between particular pillars. Properly connected pillars form 3 subindexes, on which GCI index is based:

subindex based on the basic development factors: 1-4 pillars
subindex based on the efficiency enhancement factors: 5-10 pillars
subindex based on the innovation and sophistications factors: 11-12 pillars

The value of subindexes reflects assignment of countries to a given group of economy, remaining in one of three stages of development:

I stage - factor-driven stage;
II stage - efficiency-driven stage;
III stage - innovation-driven stage.

Weights of three subindexes were defined during GCI index construction. The main criterion for defining weights is the level of economic development measured by the value of GDP per capita and influence of natural resources extraction on economy.

The values of 114 variables included in the GCI index are mainly from annual survey conducted by the World Economic Forum, which is additionally supplemented with data gathered from UN agencies, e.g. UNESCO, WHO, the International Monetary Fund.

Due to the crisis caused by COVID-19, the authors of the GCI index decided not to rank national economies in 2020 according to the level of their competitiveness. Details on: https://www.weforum.org/reports/the-global-competitiveness-report-2020

The number of economies included in the ranking has been changing since the setting-up of the GCI index, 139 economies of the world were compiled in the ranking in 2010, in 2011 - 142, in 2012 – 144, in 2013 – 148, in 2014 – 144, in 2015 – 140, in 2016 – 138, in 2017 - 137, in 2018 - 140 and in 2019 - 141.