The United States of America ranks 19th worldwide in the retirement security of its citizens, according to a new Natixis Global Retirement Index. The findings suggest that Americans will need to pick up a bigger share of their retirement costs – especially as the number of retirees grows and the government’s ability to
support them fades. The gauges how well retired citizens live in 150 nations, based on measures of health, material well-being, finances and other factors.

Top Countries for Retirees

• 1 – Norway
• 2 – Switzerland
• 3 – Luxembourg
• 6 – Finland
• 9 – Germany
• 10 – France
• 11 – Australia
• 13 – Canada
• 15 – Japan
• 19 – USA
• 20 – United Kingdom

Western European nations – backed by robust health care and retiree social programs – dominate the top of the rankings, taking the first 10 spots, including Sweden, Austria, Netherlands and Denmark. The USA finished ahead of the United Kingdom, but trailed the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Globally, the number of people aged 65 or older is on track to triple by 2050. By that time, the ratio of the working-age population to those over 65 in the USA is expected to drop from 5-to-1 to 2.8-to-1. The USA actually does much better demographically (not aging as quickly) as other rich countries mainly due to immigration. Slowing immigration going forward would make this problem worse (and does now for countries like Japan that have very restrictive immigration policies).

The economic downturn has taken a major toll on retirement savings. According to a recent report by the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, the country is facing a retirement savings deficit of $6.6 trillion, or nearly $57,000 per household. As a result, 53% of American workers 30 and older are on a path that will leave them unprepared for retirement, up significantly from 38% in 2011.

On another blog I recently wrote about another study looking at the Best Countries to Retirement Too: Ecuador, Panama, Malaysia. The study in the case was looking not at the overall state of retirees that worked in the country (as the study discussed in this post did) but instead where expat retirees find good options (which stretch limited retirement savings along with other benefits to retirees).

See the full press release.

Related: Top Stock Market Capitalization by Country from 1990 to 2010 – Easiest Countries in Which to Operate a Businesses: Singapore, Hong Kong, New Zealand, USA – Largest Nuclear Power Generation Countries from 1985-2010 – Leading countries for Economic Freedom: Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland – Countries with the Top Manufacturing Production

Chart of manufacturing production by China, USA, Japan and Germany from 1999 to 2011. The chart was created by the Curious Cat Economics Blog using UN data. You may use the chart with attribution. All data is shown in current USD (United States Dollar).

The story of global manufacturing production continues to be China’s growth, which is the conventional wisdom. The conventional wisdom however is not correct in the belief that the USA has failed. China shot past the USA, which dropped into 2nd place, but the USA still manufactures a great deal and has continually increased output (though very slowly in the last few years).

The story is pretty much the same as I have been writing for 8 years now. The biggest difference in that story is just that China actually finally moved into 1st place in 2010 and, maybe, the slowing of the USA growth in output (if that continues, I think the USA growth will improve). I said last year, that I expected China to build on the lead it finally took, and they did so. I expect that to continue, but I also wouldn’t be surprised to see China’s momentum slow (especially a few more years out – it may not slow for 3 or 4 more years).

As before, the four leading nations for manufacturing production remain solidly ahead of all the rest. Korea and Italy had manufacturing output of $313 billion in 2011 and Brazil moved up to $308 are in 4-6 place. Those 3 countries together could be in 4th place (ahead of just Germany). Even adding Korea and Italy together the total is short of Germany by $103 in 2011). I would expect Korea and Brazil to grow manufacturing output substantially more than Italy in the next 5 years.

The country supposedly growing their manufacturing the most in the last 10 years is Russia, up 375%. Frankly I don’t believe that data accurately reflects reality. China is next, up 346%. Followed by Indonesia up 345.6%, Brazil up 280%, India up 255%, South Korea up 163% and then Germany up 95%. The figures are all in current USD, inflation alone would result in an increase of about 27% for the period. The slowest gains in manufacturing output are the UK (up just 21%), USA up 32%, Japan up 33% and France up 43%.

Chart of manufacturing production from 1999 to 2011 by the 5th through 14th largest manufacturing countries. The chart was created by the Curious Cat Economics Blog using UN data. You may use the chart with attribution. All data is shown in current USD (United States Dollar).

Of course, when looking at economic data all sorts of questions can be raised. My not believing the Russia data, for example. Also even accepting an inflation of 27% for the economy as a whole, for many manufactured goods that may not be very accurate. And using US $ for everyone creates some issues based on foreign exchange movements (so a country could actually produce 10% more in their own currency but if that currency fell 20% against the $ then they would show a 10% decline in manufacturing output). The data has weaknesses that have to be understood. Even so the data is useful and provides a very good long term picture of what is really going on economically.

I actually believe the USA’s 10 year figure is a discrepancy, but we will see how things shape up in the next 5 to 10 years. The USA had some very bad years from 2006 to 2009.

I expect in the next 10 years Indonesia and Brazil will do quite well and have a great shot at being among the tops in this group of the 14 leading manufacturing countries. China will likely do well, but I think growth will slow and it may well fall back from the lead (though likely remain somewhat near the top). India could do well, but their continued failure to address infrastructure and corruption problems make it very challenging. If they successfully addressed those they could easily be in the lead. I doubt they will though, so I expect them to be held back. Mexico has a chance to do very well, though they also have problems to deal with.

A bunch of the leading countries will struggle to grow significantly. The USA, Japan, Germany, Italy, Russia, France, UK, Spain and Canada are not likely to do fantastically. I would expect the USA to be near the top of this group. That leaves Korea as a country I think can outperform all in the previous sentence but to have trouble keeping up with any of the countries in the previous paragraph that don’t create problems for themselves.

Related: Manufacturing Output as Percent of GDP from 1980 to 2010 by Country – Manufacturing Employment Data: USA, Japan, Germany, UK and more, 1990 to 2009 – Top 15 Manufacturing Countries in 2009 – How Accurate is Manufacturing Data? – Top 12 Manufacturing Countries in 2007

The chart below shows manufacturing production by country as a percent of GDP of the 10 countries that manufacture the most. China has over 30% of the GDP from manufacturing, though the GDP share fell dramatically from 2005 and is solidly in the lead.

Nearly every country is decreasing the percentage of their economic output from manufacturing. Korea is the only exception, in this group. I would expect Korea to start following the general trend. Also China has reduced less than others, I expect China will also move toward the trend shown by the others (from 2005 to 2010 they certainly did).

For the 10 largest manufacturing countries in 2010, the overall manufacturing GDP percentage was 24.9% of GDP in 1980 and dropped to 17.7% in 2010. The point often missed by those looking at their country is most of these countries are growing manufacturing, they are just growing the rest of their economy more rapidly. It isn’t accurate to see this as a decline of manufacturing. It is manufacturing growing more slowly than (information technology, health care, etc.).

This chart shows manufacturing output, as percent of GDP, by country and was created by the Curious Cat Economics Blog based on UN data. You may use the chart with attribution.

The manufacturing share of the USA economy dropped from 21% in 1980 to 18% in 1990, 15% in 2000 and 13% in 2010. Still, as previous posts show, the USA manufacturing output has grown substantially: over 300% since 1980, and 175% since 1990. The proportion of manufacturing output by the USA (for the top 10 manufacturers) has declined from 33% in 1980, 32% in 1990, 35% in 2000 to 26% in 2010. If you exclude China, the USA was 36% of the manufacturing output of these 10 countries in 1980 and 36% in 2010. China’s share grew from 7.5% to 27% during that period.

The United Kingdom has seen manufacturing fall all the way to 10% of GDP, manufacturing little more than they did 15 years ago. Japan is the only other country growing manufacturing so slowly (but Japan has one of the highest proportion of GDP from manufacturing – at 20%). Japan manufactures very well actually, the costs are very high and so they have challenges but they have continued to manufacture quite a bit, even if they are not growing output much.

India’s manufacturing output as a percent of GDP bounces around a bit this is largely because they were such a small manufacturer (and the rapid and somewhat chaotic growth of their economy in general). India’s economy benefited greatly from information technology and call center jobs for economic growth. Very few other emerging economies have had alternatives to manufacturing to grow their economies quickly.

India still is manufacturing far below their potential for several reasons: poor infrastructure, incredibly poorly functioning bureaucracy standing in the way of manufacturing business opportunities and corruption. Without addressing these issues much more successfully it is hard for me to believe they will become a serious manufacturer (even with huge amounts of available labor and a very large domestic market).

India has been trying to grow their manufacturing output, and has done so in the last 10 years. I do think India can move ahead of England and France but, India’s manufacturing output could also easily be overtaken by Indonesia, Mexico, and others, if they don’t deal with their systemic weaknesses much more effectively.

Of the top 10 manufacturing countries, those with the largest manufacturing portions of their economies in 2010 were: China 32% and South Korea 27.5%. Globally, while manufacturing has grown, other areas of economic activity have been growing faster than manufacturing.

Related: The Relative Economic Position of the USA is Likely to Decline – Manufacturing Data, Accuracy Questions – Top 12 Manufacturing Countries in 2007 – Manufacturing Employment Data: 1979 to 2007 – USA Manufacturing Output Continues to Increase (over the long term)

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Nuclear power provided 14% of the world’s electricity in 2010. Wind power capacity increased 233% Worldwide from 2005 2010, to a total of 2.5% of global electricity needs. Nuclear power generation declined by .72% for the same period.

Burning coal was responsible for 41% of electricity generation in 2010. Burning natural gas accounted for 21% and hydroelectric generation accounted for 15%.

Japan just announced that they have closed their last operating nuclear power plant. They have no nuclear power plant generating electricity for the first time in more than 40 years. It will be interesting to see how low their actual generation totals fall this year. They plan to re-open some of the plants but it is a political issue that is far from settled.

Globally nuclear power production increased 84% from 1985 to 2010. This is a very low percentage. Global output over that period increased much more than that, as did global electricity use. The share of electricity production provided by nuclear power peaked at about 17% for much of the 1990s.

Related: Nuclear Power Production Globally from 1985 to 2009 – Oil Production by Country 1999-2009 – Top 10 Countries for Manufacturing Production from 1980 to 2010: China, USA, Japan, Germany… – Japan to Add Personal Solar Subsidies – Nuclear Energy Institute (statistics)

Another view of data on nuclear power shows which of the leading nuclear producing countries have the largest percentages of their electrical generating capacity provided by nuclear power plants (as of 2009). France has 75% of all electricity generated from nuclear power. Ukraine had the second largest percentage at 49%, then Sweden at 37% and South Korea at 35%. Japan is at 28% compared to 20% for the USA. Russia was at 18% and China was at just 2%.

The USA dollar seems lousy to me. Huge debt (both government and consumer). Government debt is huge on the books and huge off the books (state and local retirement – and federal medical care [social security is really in much better shape than people think, though it also has issues 30 + years out}).

The Euro seemed a bit lame 3 years ago. Today it seems crazy to think at least one Euro country won’t default in the next 3 years – and likely more. And if they take steps to avoid that it seems like it is going to make the case for the Euro worse).

The Japanese Yen is much stronger than makes any sense to me. I think it is mainly because of how lousy all the options are. The huge government debt (worse that almost anywhere) and lousy demographics (and the refusal to deal with demographics with immigration or something) are big problems. The biggest reason for strength is that the individuals have huge savings (when your citizens own the debt it is much less horrible than when others do – especially when you are looking at currency value).

The Chinese Yuan is the best looking at the economic data. The problem is economic data is questionable for the best cases (looking at the USA, Japan…). China’s economic data is far from transparent. Their is also great political and social risk. The current worries of a real estate bubble seems justified to me and China just this week took exactly the wrong action – trying to prop up the bubble (in order to decrease the economic slowdown). I can see either of these cases playing out 10 years from now: It was obvious the Yuan was the strongest currency you are an idiot for not being able to see that or It was obvious China was a bubble with unsustainable policies and likely social upheaval thinking that was anything but a sign to sell the Yuan was foolish.

Given all this I think I weakly come down on the side that the Yuan is likely to be the strongest.

The safest play I think is the US dollar (as lousy as it is on an absolute basis the options make it look almost good). It could get clobbered. But that seems less likely than the others getting clobbered.

Smaller currencies have some promise but they can be swamped by global moves. I really have no idea about the Brazilian Real. That might actually be a really good option. The Australian Dollar and Canadian Dollar may also. But those economies are really small. I don’t trust India: they have many good macro-economic factors but the climate for business leaves far too much to be desired (as does the pace of progress fixing those weaknesses). Many economist like them due to demographic factors. I understand that demographic factors will help, but without systemic reform I question how well India can do (it certainly has the potential to do amazingly well, but they seem to be significantly farther away from reaching their potential compared to many countries).

The Singapore Dollar seems good on many levels, but the economy is small. I am not really sure about emerging economies, there currencies can get swamped in a hurry. Thailand and Indonesia experienced this recently. Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia are interesting to me in thinking about what their currencies may experience, I would like to read more on this.

This is more an intellectual and curiosity exercise than something I see directly tied to my investing strategy. But having clear answers of what I thought reasonable scenarios were for currencies going forward that would factor into my investing decisions. Right now, the confusing this causes me, leads me to favor companies that should be fine whatever happens: Apple, Google, Toyota, Intel (I don’t really like Facebook overall but in this way they fit). Lots of the stocks in my 12 stocks for 10 years portfolio, you might notice.

Related: Is the Euro Going to Survive in the Long Run? – Why the Dollar is Falling – Strong Singapore Dollar – Warren Buffett Cautions Against Buying Long Term USD Bonds

• 2 Billionaire Brothers’ Insider Buying At Colfax by Zack Miller – “[In] the Danaher Business System… management believes its found a demonstrable, repeatable recipe for success, and it drives both culture and process at the company and its acquisitions. DBS is a form of Japanese kaizen, comprising 4 components: 1) People 2) Plans 3) Processes 4) Performance” [I own Danaher and have it in my 12 stocks for 10 year portfolio - John, my management blog focuses on such management systems]
• Apple’s Impossibly Good Quarter by John Hunter – “You can’t grow quarterly sales from $26.7 billion to $46.3 billion. $26 million to $46 million, fine that is possible, billions however – not possible. Except Apple did. You can’t grow a $6 billion quarterly profit to $13 billion in 1 year. Except Apple did. You can’t generate a cash flow of $17.5 billion in a quarter. Except Apple did. You can’t have a stockpile of $100 billion in cash. Except Apple does. These figures would not have been seen as unlikely just 3 years ago. They were impossible. But Apple achieved them.”
• How to Save the Euro by George Soros – “the cuts in government expenditures that Germany wants to impose on other countries will push Europe into a deflationary debt trap. Reducing budget deficits will put both wages and profits under downward pressure, the economies will contract, and tax revenues will fall. So the debt burden, which is a ratio of the accumulated debt to the GDP, will actually rise, requiring further budget cuts, setting in motion a vicious circle.”
• Japan’s Trade Figures: Some Perspective by Eamonn Fingleton – “In a typical maneuver, goods might be shipped to China via Hong Kong. The goods are exported from Japan at heavily discounted prices and a Hong Kong subsidiary takes a huge profit in selling to China. Such profits constitute hidden export revenues that are not caught in the visible trade numbers. The maneuver makes sense because Japan’s corporate tax rate is one of the world’s highest.” [This is one, of many things, that make economic data difficult to rely on - you have to pay close attention to the details - John]
• Krugman Take on $12 Trillion Question Rings True – “Japan’s toxic mix of too much debt, too little growth, too many old people and too few babies will end badly if Tokyo doesn’t get its act together. It’s important, though, to highlight where Fingleton is right. Japan is pretty close to a model society. It is an incredibly safe, clean, efficient, predictable…”
• Wall Street’s Achilles’ Heel – Efficient Market Hypothesis Doesn’t Always Work by Shailesh Kumar – “Market inefficiencies create undervaluation that an investor can buy into. In some other cases, it can also create overvaluation that an investor can sell into or avoid. It is beneficial for a self managed investor to be alert for these situations as the difference in performance between a value biased portfolio and a market neutral portfolio can be very significant over the life of the portfolio.”
• These Three Jobs Are a Great Way for a Teen to Earn Money and Learn Something About Life at the Same Time – “My opinion is that one of the best ways for a teenager to learn about making and saving money is to get a summer-job, or work part-time. These are absolutely amazing ways to gain valuable experience in helping others and learn about responsibility, endurance, and teamwork, and earn money in the process”
• USA Spends $7,960 Compared to $3,800 for Other Rich Countries on Health Care with No Better Health Results by John Hunter – “It is possible to argue the USA provides mediocre results, which is consistent with most global health care performance measures. Unless you directly benefit from the current USA system it is hard to see how you can argue it is not the worst system of any rich country: costing twice as much and achieving middling performance.”

GDP in USD for countries

I just picked countries that interested me and seemed worth looking at. I looked for some around the starting position of Singapore and close to Singapore geographically. And looked at Panama as the closest match to Singapore (for Singapore’s main 1970 asset, convenient for shipping lanes, and very close for GDP per capita).

Malaysia and Singapore were 1 country after independence (from 1963-1965).

I can’t imagine more than a couple countries could reasonably be argued to have had better economic performance from 1970 to 2010 than Singapore (Korea? China? Who else?). Singapore had very little going for it in 1970. They had a good location for shipping and that is about it macro-economically. No natural resources. No huge storage of wealth. No preeminence in science, technology or business.

It seems to me that Singapore actually did have 1 other thing. A government that was to preside over a fantastic economic growth success. You won’t find many textbooks talking about the way to economic success is a very well run government. And there is good reason for that, I believe. Relying on a very well run government will nearly always fail. In some ways Singapore was like Japan but with significantly more government influence on the way economic development played out.

I was surprised how poorly the USA has faired. It isn’t so surprising that we lagged. People forget how rich the USA was in 1970. The USA is still very rich but bunched together with lots of other rich countries instead of way out ahead as they were in 1970. And in 1970 the lead was already contracting, for what it had been earlier. But even knowing the relative performance of the USA had lagged, I was surprised by how much it under-performed.

I was also surprised with India. I knew they have done poorly but I didn’t realize it had been this poor. The failures to greatly improve infrastructure, education and the stifling effect of their bureaucracy have been causing them great harm. They have been doing some good things in the last 10 years especially but still have a long way to go. Their premier education is actually pretty decent. The problem is the other 90% of the education is often poor and many people (especially women) hardly have any education at all. It is very hard to get ahead when you fail to take advantage of the talents of so many of your people.

Related: Singapore and Iskandar Malaysia – Chart of Largest Petroleum Consuming Countries from 1980 to 2010 – Chart of Nuclear Power Production by Country from 1985-2009 – Top Countries For Renewable Energy Capacity

** I made an adjustment which distorts the data a bit but seems fine to me. I adjusted the 1970 figure provided by the source using the US Fed price deflator. I took 24 for 1970 and 111 for 2010. Then I divided 111 by 24 = 4.625. So I multiplied the 1970 figure by 4.625 so that the 2010 and 1970 figures are reported on an equivalent basis (so $10,000 in 1970 column = $10,000 in the 2010 column). Then the percentage increase are not having inflation inflating the percentage increase. Also it makes the 1970s figure more easily understandable (it is hard to appreciate that $2,500 is a high figure for GDP per capita).

*** many of the 2010 figures are IMF forecasts

Chart of manufacturing production by the top 10 manufacturing countries (2000 to 2010). The chart was created by the Curious Cat Economics Blog. You may use the chart with attribution. All data is shown in 2010 USD (United States Dollar).

In my last post I looked at the output of the top 10 manufacturing countries with a focus on 1980 to 2010. Here I take a closer look at the last 10 years.

In 2010, China took the lead as the world’s leading manufacturing country from the USA. In 1995 the USA was actually very close to losing the lead to Japan (though you wouldn’t think it looking at the recent data). I believe China will be different, I believe China is going to build on their lead. As I discussed in the last post the data doesn’t support any decline in Chinese manufacturing (or significant moves away from China toward other South-East Asian countries). Indonesia has grown quickly (and have the most manufacturing production, of those discussed), but their total manufacturing output is less than China grew by per year for the last 5 years.

The four largest countries are pretty solidly in their positions now: the order will likely be China, USA, Japan, Germany for 10 years (or longer): though I could always be surprised. In the last decade China relentlessly moved past the other 3, to move from 4th to 1st. Other than that though, those 3 only strengthened their position against their nearest competitors. Brazil, Korea or India would need to increase production quite rapidly to catch Germany sooner. After the first 4 though the situation is very fluid.

Taking a closure look at the large group of countries after top 4. Chart of manufacturing production from 2000-2010.

Chart of manufacturing production by the leading manufacturing countries (2000 to 2010). The top 4 countries are left off to look more closely at history of the next group. The chart was created by the Curious Cat Economics Blog based on UN data. You may use the chart with attribution.

Removing the top 4 to take a close look at the data on the other largest manufacturing countries we see that there are many countries bunched together. It is still hard to see, but if you look closely, you can make out that some countries are growing well, for example: Brazil, India and Indonesia. Other countries (most in Europe, as well as Mexico) did not fare well in the last decade.

The UK had a particularly bad decade, moving from first place in this group (5th in the world) to 5th in this group and likely to be passed by India in 2011. Europe has 4 countries in this list (if you exclude Russia) and they do not appear likely to do particularly well in the next decade, in my opinion. I would certainly expect Brazil, India, Korea and Indonesia to out produce Italy, France, UK and Spain in 2020. In 2010 the total was $976 billion by the European 4 to $961 billion by the non-European 4. In 2000 it was $718 billion for the European 4 to $343 billion (remember all the data is in 2010 USD).

Mexico is left of that comparison (and I would expect them to be below all the others in the comparison – but also substituting them for any of the 4 I would still believe those 4 countries would out-manufacture the European group. Also adding Russia to the Europe group and Mexico to the other group I would also expect the non-Europe group to manufacture more. I actually think Mexico has great potential but they did not have a particularly good decade and need to do a better job to realize their potential (being right next to the USA is a great advantage).

From 2000 to 2010 China grew manufacturing output by 298%. India was next at 232% and Brazil followed with 193%. The UK performed the worst, up just 2%, while Japan was up 5%. The USA was next worst up just 22% for the decade, which while still an increase. For decades there has been all sorts of talk about how the USA doesn’t manufacture anything anymore. This is just false. It is true that manufacturing jobs have been disappearing but this is a global phenomenon (even in countries growing manufacturing very quickly). It is also true the rest of the USA economy is growing faster than manufacturing output over the last few decades and so the percentage of manufacturing compared to the overall economy has shrunk (but this is due to higher growth elsewhere – manufacturing continues to increase). 2011 may actually have been quite a good year for manufacturing in the USA.

Related: Chart of Largest Petroleum Consuming Countries from 1980 to 2010 – USA, China and Japan Lead Manufacturing Output in 2008 – Manufacturing Employment Data: USA, Japan, Germany, UK… 1990-2009 – Top 15 Manufacturing Countries in 2009 –

The last few years I have had to estimate China’s manufacturing output (to separate out mining production), this year the data is provided using the same criteria for each country: manufacturing comprises units engaged in the physical or chemical transformation of materials, substances, or components into new products (see more detail). Economic data is never perfect and when you are comparing between countries it gets even more difficult (and the measurement discrepancies distort the data – compared to the state you are trying to measure). But still the data useful and interesting; understanding it includes some noise.

I found some interesting data from the USA census bureau on manufacturing employment in several countries (it would be interesting to see the data for more countries but for now I am limited to this data). Sadly they just use indexed data (I would rather see raw data). This data for example lets you see the changes in countries but I don’t see any way to compare the absolute values between countries – all you can compare is the changes between countries.

The data is all indexed at 2002 = 100. Interestingly the USA has increased output per hour much more than any other country since 2002. The USA index stands at 146, the next highest is Sweden at 127 then the UK at 120. Italy is the only country tracked that fell since 2002, to 94. Japan (the 3rd largest manufacturer and 2nd largest of the countries include, China isn’t included) only increased to 113. Germany (4th and 3rd) increased to 111.

The data also lets you look back from 1990 to 2002 and again the USA has increased productivity very well (2nd most) – the value in 1990 was 58. Sweden actually had the largest gain from 1990-2002, rising from 49. In 1990 Japan stood at 71 and Germany 70.

Compensation in the countries currency is remarkably consistent across all countries from 1990-2009. Japan shows the only significant divergence in the period of 2002 – 2009 actually decreasing pay in real terms (a small amount – from 100 to 98) while the average increases to about 110. So those with jobs are seeing increases in pay above inflation (except in Japan).

Total manufacturing employment is on a steady decline everywhere, which is consistent with all the other data we have seen over the years, everywhere. Norway has barely decreased (and Canada actually grew from 1990-2002) but overall there have been significant declines across the board. The UK lost the most employment the 2002 – 2009 drop (ending at 75.4); with the USA in 2nd – dropping to 58.4; and Canada coming in 3rd dropping to 81. Italy did fairly well on the employment front from 111 in 1990 to 95 in 2009. Aggregate hours also saw large declines across the board.

Related: Manufacturing Jobs Data: USA and China 1990 to 2004 – USA Manufacturing Output Continues to Increase (over the long term) – Manufacturing Output as a Percent of GDP by Country – Manufacturing Jobs

Chart of petroleum consumption by country 1980-2010 by the Curious Cat Investing and Economics Blog. The chart may be used with attribution.

The USA remains, by a huge margin, the largest consumer of petroleum products (motor gasoline, jet fuel, liquefied petroleum gases, residential fuel oil…) using 22% of the total (with about 4.5% of the population). From 1980 to 2010 the global consumption increased 38% to 87 million barrels a day.

From 1980 to 2010 USA consumption increased 12% (so less than global consumption). Meanwhile, Germany, Japan and France decreased petroleum use by 19%, 17% and 10% respectively. Many countries have very low use in 1980 and have grown their economies dramatically over this period and increased petroleum use dramatically also: India up 433%, China up 411%, South Korea up 360%.

Africa, in total, used 3.3 million barrels a day in 2010, up 120% from 1980. Africa used 73% of what Japan used in 2010 and 17% of what the USA used and 50% more than Canada. The data shows no sign of declining petroleum consumption on a global basis. The USA uses as much as China, India, Brazil and Africa combined. I believe, in 2015 those countries (by which I mean all the countries in Africa too, not that Africa is a country, which of course it is not) will use more than the USA (and likely show significant growth from 2010 levels).

Data is from the US Energy Information Agency.

Related: Oil Production by Country 1999-2009 – Top Countries For Renewable Energy Capacity – Chart of Nuclear Power Production by Country from 1985-2009 – Increasing USA Foreign Oil Dependence In The Last 40 years