Category Archives: World

The Most Honest Cities in the World

Reader’s Digest conducted an experiment where a total of 192 wallets were lost in 16 cities around the world, about 12 wallets per city, to see how many of those would be returned to their rightful owners. Each wallet contained cash, credit cards, and the owner’s contact information.

The results show the most honest cities as Helsinki (Finland) and Mumbai (India). On the other hand, cities where the fewer number of lost wallets were returned to their owners include Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Zurich (Switzerland), Madrid (Spain), and Lisbon (Portugal).

Source: International Business Times: Most Honest Cities In The World: The Lost Wallet Experiment [Infographic]

Hardworking People in the World

In some countries people work really hard and in others they don’t. In the map above we can see that countries where people are the most hardworking (orange) include Mexico, South Korea, and Chile, while countries where people just take it easy (blue) include France, Germany, Italy, and Norway.

This map was elaborated for OECD countries only. To get this numbers the author took into consideration the average annual hours worked per person and the average age of retirement per worker for each OECD country.

Source: Business Insider: MAP: Here Are The Countries That Work Hard And The Ones Where They Like To Relax

Syrian Refugees in 2013

Since the armed conflict began in Syria, an estimated 100,000 people have been killed, and as many as 2 million people had fled the nation seeking refuge in neighboring countries. The majority of the refugees had fled to neighboring Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan. Egypt and Iraq have seen an influx of Syrian refugees as well.

Additionally, another 4 million people had been internally displaced, roughly 1 of every 4 inhabitants, including an estimated 2 million children.

Source: PBS: Syrian Refugees

Parts of the World With No McDonald’s

If you travel outside the United States the likelihood that you will find a McDonald’s is very high. However, there are still many countries that do not have one. Such is the case of most South Saharan African countries, with the exception of South Africa, Botswana, and Kenya; Iran, Syria, Turkmenistan, and Afghanistan in the Middle East; Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Papua New Guinea in Asia; Cuba, Haiti, Bolivia, and Guyana in the America’s. It is interesting to see that Iceland, being a highly developed European nation, does not have one either.

Note: We found this interesting map on the web, but we were unable to find its original source to give it proper credit and link to it as the source for this blog post.

The Economic Freedom Index 2013

The Economic Freedom Index, compiled by the Heritage Foundation, is a measure of the economic freedom given to citizens in each of the 185 countries where it is measured. A total of ten components of economic freedom are considered, all grouped under four categories: rule of law, limited government, regulatory efficiency, and open markets.

The highest ranking country in the list is Hong Kong, with a score of 89.3, affording its citizens the highest degree of economic freedom in the world. Hong Kong is followed by Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Switzerland, Canada, Chile, Mauritius, Denmark, and the United States, among the top ten.

On the opposite side, the most repressed countries in terms of economic freedom include North Korea, Cuba, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, Eritrea, and Burma.

Source: International Business Times: US Economic Freedom Is At Lowest Point Since 2000 [MAP]

Refugees: Where Do They Come From?

As a consequence of armed conflicts happening in different parts of the world, inhabitants in those regions had been forced to flee and seek refuge in other countries.

As of 2011, the largest number of refugees was coming from Afghanistan (2.6 million people), followed by Iraq (1.4 million), and Somalia (1 million), as seen in the map above in color red. Countries where these refugees were seeking asylum included Pakistan, Iran, Syria, Kenya, Germany, and Jordan.

Up to the point when this data was collected, there was not an armed conflict going on in Syria. In fact, Syria was listed as an asylum destination for refugees coming from Iraq. That has changed now, and Syria has joined other countries torn by conflict whose inhabitants are seeking asylum in other parts of the world.

Source: Global Refugee Tracker: where are refugees from? And where do they go (2011)

Every Protest in the World Since 1979

According to the Global Database of Events, Language, and Tone (GDELT) website, an estimated 250 million incidents have occurred since 1979, ranging from protests and violence, to change in military or police attitudes.

The dots spread across North Africa in 2011, for example, hint to the Arab Spring protests taking place at the time in that region. In a similar manner the cluster of dots concentrated in the Middle East, more precisely in Syria, point to the ongoing conflict in that country.

For the interactive map, please visit: Foreign Policy: Mapped: Every Protest on the Planet Since 1979

The Higher Cost of Higher Education

Studying abroad can be very expensive, specially if you are looking at universities in Australia or the United States.

The average cost of higher education for international students is very high in Australia, where a student is expected to pay a total of $38,516 in annual fees and cost of living. Australia is followed by the U.S. where the average cost of one year of higher education is estimated at $35,705. Other countries with a steep tab on higher education include the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

On the other hand, more affordable higher education can be found in Germany, where the average cost of one year of college annual fees plus cost of living is estimated at $6,285. Other countries with affordable higher education include Spain, Taiwan, China, and Russia.

Source: International Business Times- International Students: Higher Education Is Really Inexpensive In Germany, But Not In The US [CHARTS]

Deaths by Hepatitis vs. Deaths by HIV by Country

HIV killed 1.47 million people in 2010. Viral hepatitis killed as many as 1.44 million people in the same year. Even though the number of deaths caused by viral hepatitis follows close that of HIV, its impact goes largely ignored worldwide.

According to The Economist, viral hepatitis killed more people in 117 out of 187 countries, including China, India, Japan, and the UK. In the map above, countries in dark red show a higher ratio of deaths by viral hepatitis to deaths caused by HIV. Those countries include Egypt, Mongolia, UK, Turkey, Yemen, Iraq, South and North Korea, Japan, Finland, Sweden, Poland, and Germany.

Source: The Economist: The other killer – Hepatitis kills more people than HIV in most countries

Minutes of Minimum-Wage Work to Buy a Big Mac Burger

Using the criteria of the Big Mac Index developed by The Economist in 1986 as a way to measure if currencies are valued at the right level, the International Business Times created this visualization showing how many minutes a minimum-wage worker needs to work in order to buy a Big Mac burger.

As it turns out, a minimum-wage worker in Afghanistan needs to work 372 minutes (6.2 hours) in order to buy a Big Mac burger. In contrast, a minimum-wage worker in Australia needs to work only 18 minutes to buy a Big Mac burger.

Source: International Business Times: Minutes Of Minimum-Wage Work To Buy A Big Mac: 36 minutes in the US, 6 hours in Afghanistan

IndexMundi Blog

Country profiles in depth