SSC CGL Economics · National Income, Growth and Development Indicators
Economic Indices and Reports
Which body publishes each global index or report, what each one measures, and the Phillips curve.
Why this matters
Sixteen questions in the bank, and 15 of them come from the 2025 shifts: global indices were new to the 2025 papers. Nearly every question asks who publishes an index or what it measures, so the publisher table is the whole job.
Concept 1 of 2: Who publishes which index
Definition
The pairs:
- Index of Economic Freedom: the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington.
- Logistics Performance Index: the World Bank.
- World Competitiveness Ranking: the IMD business school in Switzerland. It measures how well a country lets enterprises compete.
- Global Gender Gap Report and the Travel and Tourism Development Index: the World Economic Forum. The gender gap is measured in economy, education, health and politics.
- World Happiness Report: the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network, not the UNDP. It counts social support and freedom among its factors.
- Sustainable Development Report: tracks the 17 Sustainable Development Goals.
- Corruption Perceptions Index: Transparency International.
Practise this conceptself-check · 3 quick reps
The same idea in a real exam question:
Example 1 · National Income, Growth and Development Indicators · Economic Indices and Reports
The Happiness Report is not the UNDP's
Concept 2 of 2: What the indices and curves measure
Definition
The facts:
- Corruption Perceptions Index: scores run from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean), so a low score means more corruption.
- Ease of Doing Business (World Bank): it used 10 indicators, starting a business among them, without giving that one the most weight, and it left out the informal sector, which is hard to measure the same way everywhere.
- Index of Economic Freedom: its Government Size pillar looks at government spending and the tax burden.
- Logistics Performance Index 2023: added indicators of trade speed from big data on shipments.
- Phillips curve: the inverse relation between the rate of change of money wages and unemployment.
- India ranks below most South Asian neighbours on happiness, but its income per head is not the lowest in South Asia.
Practise this conceptself-check · 3 quick reps
The same idea in a real exam question:
Example 2 · National Income, Growth and Development Indicators · Economic Indices and Reports
Starting a business was not given the most weight
Summary — formulas & gotchas at a glance
A revision cheat-sheet for the formulas and gotchas above. Click any concept name to jump back to its full explanation.
Reference tables (2)
Watch out for (2)
- The Happiness Report is not the UNDP's→ Who publishes which index
- Starting a business was not given the most weight→ What the indices and curves measure
Test yourself on National Income, Growth and Development Indicators
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