Abstract

Here, I present GDP (per capita) forecasts of major economies until 2050. Since GDP per capita is the best generalized predictor of many important variables, such as welfare, GDP forecasts can give us a more concrete picture of what the world might look like in just 27 years. The key claim here is: even if AI does not cause transformative growth, our business-as-usual near-future is still surprisingly different from today.

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In recent history, we've seen unprecedented economic growth and rises in living standards.

Consider this graph:^[1]

How will living standards improve as GDP per capita (GDP/cap) rises? Here, I show data that projects GDP/cap until 2050. Forecasting GDP per capita is a crucial undertaking as it strongly correlates with welfare indicators like consumption, leisure, inequality, and mortality. These forecasts make the future more concrete and give us a better sense of what the world will look like soon. Abstract thoughts about utopia generate little emotional energy; I find these forecasts more plastic and informative, because GDP/cap is highly predictive of welfare.^[2] GDP/cap's generalized predictive power helps us paint a more vivid picture of what the world will look like soon. The business-as-usual near future suggested by the data below could be seen as a soft lower bound on how much the world will change. And yet, this world still seems radically different from today.

Since the figures below are adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP), you can compare the GDP/cap of a poorer country in 2050 with the GDP/cap of a richer country in 2020. For instance, between now and 2050, China's GDP/cap will go from $19k to $43k, which is similar to France's today. And so, by 2050, 1.3B Chinese people might enjoy a lifestyle not dissimilar to that of a typical French person today.

These GDP/cap are ~3x^[3] higher than the median (i.e. typical) income, due to income inequality. Instead of downward adjusting them in our head we can also read them as an approximation of the typical combined consumption three person household.^[4] And so, we can still look at these figures and imagine the median household income in Japan today and in China in 2050 to be ~$40k.

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