Although the government had planned to end all subsidies by 2020, they still accounted for over three-quarters of expenditures in the 2019–2020 budget.The total value of exports and imports of goods and services equals 98.4 percent of GDP. Non-petroleum industries include financial services. More than 80 percent of working-age Kuwaiti citizens are employed by the government.

The average applied tariff rate is 4.3 percent, and six nontariff measures are in force. The report is made up of 98 variables organized into twelve pillars with the most important including: institutions; infrastructure; ICT adoption; macroeconomic stability; health; skills; product market; labour market; financial system; market size; business dynamism; and innovation capability. Kuwait Economic Growth This year, activity is expected to slow markedly as slack oil demand and constrained household consumption weigh on the economy. GDP growth has stagnated over the past five years.The government’s priority is to fast-track economic reform and diversify the economy away from its reliance on hydrocarbons. In 2018, the World Economic Forum introduced a new methodology emphasizing the role of human capital, innovation, resilience and agility, as not only drivers but also defining features of economic success in the 4th Industrial Revolution. All Rights Reserved. In the 2016 parliamentary elections, opposition candidates won almost half of the seats, complicating economic reform efforts. The government saves at least 10 percent of revenue annually to cushion itself against the possible impact of lower oil prices.Noncitizens of Gulf Cooperation Council countries may not own land without special permission and face additional hurdles in the poorly developed legal system. The Trading Economics Application Programming Interface (API) provides direct access to our data. Uncertainty regarding future demand for crude oil is a key risk to the external sector, while regional geopolitical tensions and the government’s push to reduce Kuwait’s dependence on foreign workers further cloud the outlook. Trading Economics members can view, download and compare data from nearly 200 countries, including more than 20 million economic indicators, exchange rates, government bond yields, stock indexes and commodity prices. Government spending has amounted to 50.9 percent of the country’s output (GDP) over the past three years, and budget surpluses have averaged 6.1 percent of GDP. The economy of Kuwait is a small but wealthy petroleum-based economy. Foreign investment is generally welcome, but lingering bureaucracy hinders dynamic growth in new investment. It allows API clients to download millions of rows of historical data, to query our real-time economic calendar, subscribe to updates and receive quotes for currencies, commodities, stocks and bonds. Oil and gas account for nearly 60 percent of GDP and about 92 percent of export revenues. The latest projected “GDP rankings of the world’s largest economies” is based …

Kuwait controls approximately 6 percent of the world’s oil reserves. Public debt is equivalent to 14.8 percent of GDP.Starting a business has been made easier, and protections for minority investors are improved. The emir appoints all judges, and the judiciary is not independent. Foreign-owned firms and joint ventures are the only businesses subject to the flat 15 percent corporate income tax. 10Y 25Y Kuwait is ranked 8th among 14 countries in the Middle East and North Africa region, and its overall score is just above the regional and world averages.The Kuwaiti economy has been stuck in the moderately free category since its inclusion in the Index in 1996. The overall tax burden equals 1.4 percent of total domestic income. 2007-2019 Data | 2020-2022 Forecast | Historical | ChartDownload historical data for 20 million indicators using your browser.Direct access to our calendar releases and historical data. Kuwait World Economy Ranking: 61 stats Economic indicators provided by The World Bank. See how Kuwait compares to another country using any of the measures in the Index.Kuwait’s economic freedom score is 63.2, making its economy the 79th freest in the 2020 Index. Page last updated on January 27, 2020. Corruption is pervasive, and allegations of corruption lodged by lawmakers against government ministers have been at the heart of Kuwait’s recurring political crises.Individual income is not taxed. Kuwait is the second richest GCC country per capita (after Qatar). Kuwait is the 46 most competitive nation in the world out of 140 countries ranked in the 2018 edition of the Global Competitiveness Report published by the World Economic Forum.