North America - Coal rents (% of GDP)

Coal rents (% of GDP) in North America was 0.133 as of 2019. Its highest value over the past 49 years was 0.714 in 1982, while its lowest value was 0.066 in 1994.

Definition: Coal rents are the difference between the value of both hard and soft coal production at world prices and their total costs of production.

Source: Estimates based on sources and methods described in "The Changing Wealth of Nations: Measuring Sustainable Development in the New Millennium" (World Bank, 2011).

See also:

Year Value
1970 0.090
1971 0.100
1972 0.106
1973 0.117
1974 0.235
1975 0.547
1976 0.551
1977 0.522
1978 0.393
1979 0.401
1980 0.511
1981 0.689
1982 0.714
1983 0.376
1984 0.307
1985 0.306
1986 0.201
1987 0.109
1988 0.141
1989 0.181
1990 0.194
1991 0.177
1992 0.138
1993 0.070
1994 0.066
1995 0.185
1996 0.195
1997 0.181
1998 0.160
1999 0.124
2000 0.136
2001 0.206
2002 0.147
2003 0.148
2004 0.307
2005 0.255
2006 0.265
2007 0.238
2008 0.669
2009 0.318
2010 0.444
2011 0.551
2012 0.345
2013 0.262
2014 0.212
2015 0.147
2016 0.131
2017 0.174
2018 0.188
2019 0.133

Development Relevance: Accounting for the contribution of natural resources to economic output is important in building an analytical framework for sustainable development. In some countries earnings from natural resources, especially from fossil fuels and minerals, account for a sizable share of GDP, and much of these earnings come in the form of economic rents - revenues above the cost of extracting the resources. Natural resources give rise to economic rents because they are not produced. For produced goods and services competitive forces expand supply until economic profits are driven to zero, but natural resources in fixed supply often command returns well in excess of their cost of production. Rents from nonrenewable resources - fossil fuels and minerals - as well as rents from overharvesting of forests indicate the liquidation of a country's capital stock. When countries use such rents to support current consumption rather than to invest in new capital to replace what is being used up, they are, in effect, borrowing against their future.

Limitations and Exceptions: This definition of economic rent differs from that used in the System of National Accounts, where rents are a form of property income, consisting of payments to landowners by a tenant for the use of the land or payments to the owners of subsoil assets by institutional units permitting them to extract subsoil deposits.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: The estimates of natural resources rents are calculated as the difference between the price of a commodity and the average cost of producing it. This is done by estimating the world price of units of specific commodities and subtracting estimates of average unit costs of extraction or harvesting costs (including a normal return on capital). These unit rents are then multiplied by the physical quantities countries extract or harvest to determine the rents for each commodity as a share of gross domestic product (GDP).

Aggregation method: Weighted average

Periodicity: Annual

Classification

Topic: Environment Indicators

Sub-Topic: Natural resources contribution to GDP