Supply Chain

Just How Big Is Government, Anyway?

Dec. 7, 2011

Platitudes and statistics are cheap, especially in a political season.

With all of the rhetoric flying around about entitlements, deficits, and Europe's crisis, it is interesting to see just how big government really is.

Earlier this year, using data from the IMF and OECD, the Economist ran a compelling piece on government's massive expansion over the decades.

In the developed world, the average in 2009 was a staggering 47.7% of all economic activity classified as government spending.

In socialist "France", it was 56.0%. In "free market" America, it was 42.2%, almost the same as Canada's 43.8%.

What is remarkable is that the growth of government has been steady- and uninterrupted- since the late 19th century.

For developing markets like China, India, and Brazil, the numbers are even greater. Estimates there have nearly 70% of all GDP being defined as government spending.

NOTE: I've included the complete chart for developed countries as an attachment below.

About the Author

Andrew R. Thomas Blog | Associate Professor of Marketing and International Business

Andrew R. Thomas, Ph.D., is associate professor of marketing and international business at the University of Akron; and, a member of the core faculty at the International School of Management in Paris, France.

He is a bestselling business author/editor, whose 23 books include, most recently, American Shale Energy and the Global Economy: Business and Geopolitical Implications of the Fracking Revolution, The Customer Trap: How to Avoid the Biggest Mistake in Business, Global Supply Chain Security, The Final Journey of the Saturn V, and Soft Landing: Airline Industry Strategy, Service and Safety.

His book The Distribution Trap was awarded the Berry-American Marketing Association Prize for the Best Marketing Book of 2010. Another work, Direct Marketing in Action, was a finalist for the same award in 2008.

Andrew is founding editor-in-chief of the Journal of Transportation Security and a regularly featured analyst for media outlets around the world.

He has traveled to and conducted business in 120 countries on all seven continents.