Purchasing Power Parities And The Real Size Of World Economies

The 2011 International Comparison Programme (ICP) is a worldwide statistical initiative that aims to estimate Purchasing Power Parities (PPPs) to be used as currency converters to compare the size and price levels of economies around the world -- crucial information for research in comparative analysis and policy making.

The International Comparison Program (ICP) is a worldwide statistical initiative led by the World Bank under the auspices of the United Nations Statistical Commission. It produces comparable price and volume measures of gross domestic product (GDP) and its expenditure aggregates across economies. Through a partnership with international, regional, sub-regional and national agencies, the ICP collects price data and GDP expenditures to estimate purchasing power parities (PPPs) for the world’s economies. The report provides ICP results for the benchmark year 2017 and revised results for earlier years. ICP data are used for socio-economic analyses by researchers, academics, policy makers at the national and international levels, and by organizations such as the European Union, the International Monetary Fund, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the United Nations, and the World Bank. Notably, PPPs and ICP data are used in indicators monitoring progress towards eight goals of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the World Bank’s international poverty lines, and the construction of the Human Development Index by the United Nations, among others. The use of PPPs continues to grow and the ICP website (icp.worldbank.org) lists many applications of the data by the development community, academia, media and others.

This volume provides a comprehensive review of the statistical theory and methods underlying the estimation of purchasing power parities (PPPs) and real expenditures, the choices made for the 2005 International Comparison Program (ICP) round, and the lessons learned that led to improvements in the 2011 ICP.

This manual gives a complete, detailed and up-to-date description of the Eurostat-OECD PPP Programme, including its organisation, the various surveys carried out by participating countries and the ways PPPs are calculated and disseminated. It also provides guidance on the use of PPPs.

For the last twenty-five years, Eurostat and the OECD have worked together comparing the price and volume levels of the GDPs of EU Member States and OECD Member Countries. The comparisons are made with purchasing power parities or PPPs and the common programme is called the "Eurostat-OECD PPP Programme". The methodology that Eurostat and the OECD employ in their comparisons has been described in various reports and papers but there has been no single document covering the whole Programme in detail. This publication rectifies this omission,