Which country rules the world? Infographics: State of Power 2025

The United States remains the largest country in GDP terms.

Infographic Top 10 countries by GDP

Source: TNI based on Trading Economics, December 2023. https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/gdp

And if you divide up that wealth by population, the divide is bigger. 

Infographic: GDP per capita

Source: TNI based on Maddison Project database, 2022 https://dataverse.nl/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.34894/INZBF2

US also dominates financial wealth.

Infographic: Regional share of world financial wealth (2024)

Source: S.K.Starrs' calculations from Boston Consulting Group, 2024. https://web-assets.bcg.com/0c/b4/1e8b9a66409a8deae6fc166aa26e/2024-global-wealth-report-july-2024-edit-02.pdf

Infographic: Global billionaire population in 2023

Source: Altrata, 2023. https://www.google.com/url?q=https://altrata.com/reports/altratas-billionaire-census-2024&sa=D&source=docs&ust=1737735590282910&usg=AOvVaw0vUj4iVH-2Jh0MbzoTGVmc

 The biggest global corporations are also owned by the US.

US firms control 46% of the world's largest corporations

Source: Sean Kenji Starrs based on Bloomberg terminal, 2021.

And the US with the G7 sucks in much of the world’s profits and income.

Infographic: Financial flows to G7 compared to BRICS

Source: Michael Roberts and Guglielmo Carchedi, 2021. https://www.academia.edu/66353020/The_Economics_of_Modern_Imperialism

The US has become an even bigger energy superpower in the last decade.

Infographic: Crude oil production of top 10 biggest producers (2022)

Source: International Energy Agency, 2022. https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/data-product/monthly-oil-data-service-mods-supply-demand-balances-and-stocks

This is all reinforced with US military spending that far exceeds any other.

Infographic: US vs World military spending (2023)

Source: SIPRI, 2024. https://www.sipri.org/publications/2024/sipri-fact-sheets/trends-world-military-expenditure-2023 https://www.nationalpriorities.org/blog/2024/04/30/us-military-spends-more-next-10-countries-2023/

 And includes a military infrastructure that far outweighs any competitors.

Infographic: US military bases abroad (2020)

Source: Kelly Martin for David Vine, 'The United States of War' (University of California Press, 2020).

 The US also dominates outer space.

Infographic: Top six countries by satellite ownership/ joint ownership

Source: TNI based on UCS Satellite Database, May 2023. https://www.ucsusa.org/resources/satellite-database

The research for these infographics was done by Benjamin Wray with the support of Nick Buxton. Sean  Kenji Starrs also provided graphics based on his own calculations. The designs were done by Evan Clayburg.

These infographics are part of the State of Power 2025 report: Geopolitics of Capitalism. You can access the full report here.