Title page
Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 5
1. THE 2024 FREEDOM AND PROSPERITY INDEXES 7
Indexes construction 7
2. RESULTS 12
The Freedom Index 12
The Prosperity Index 20
3. THE PATH TO PROSPERITY 26
Freedom and prosperity are closely associated 26
Prosperity takes time 28
4. CONCLUSIONS AND POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS 30
METHODOLOGY 31
AUTHORS 36
ENDNOTES 37
Table 1. Changes in freedom at the regional level (2013-2023) 14
Table 2. Changes in prosperity at a regional level (2003-2023) 23
Figure 1. Structure of the Freedom Index 8
Figure 2. Structure of the Prosperity Index 10
Figure 3. Freedom Index map and ranking table 12
Figure 4. In the past ten years, political freedom has seen a sharp decline (global average, 2013-2023) 14
Figure 5. A Majority of countries have seen a decline of political freedom (2013-2023) 15
Figure 6. Twenty-nine OCED countries have seen a decline in political freedom (2013-2023) 15
Figure 7. Dimensions of Freedom in South & Central Asia (2013-2023) 16
Figure 8. Political subindex components in OECD countries and in India (2013-2023) 16
Figure 9. Women's economic freedom is progressing around the world (2013-2023) 17
Figure 10. Prosperity Index map and ranking table 20
Figure 11. Global prosperity has not fully recovered from COVID-19 (2012-2022) 22
Figure 12. In all regions, COVID-19 erased years of health progress (1995-2022) 22
Figure 13. Evolution of prosperity in Africa's largest countries (2012-2022) 23
Figure 14. Freedom is highly correlated with prosperity (2023) 26
Figure 15. The causal relation of freedom and prosperity changes (1995 to 2023) 27
Figure 16. The higher the freedom improvement, the higher the higher the prosperity increase (1995-2023) 28
Figure 17. Prosperity might take time, but freedom delivers (local linear projection) 29