Is professed religion is important for economic development? We checked it out on a group of countries, which started from a similar starting point to Poland. The analysis money.pl that where the dominant religion is Roman Catholicism economy grew the fastest, and the people are richer. The worst coped … unbelievers. This, however, by the secular Ukraine.
In the two centuries since the beginning of the Protestant Reformation countries economically distanced Catholic states. The fact that it prospered them economically better than Catholic countries, much has been written and adopted once for granted that the cause was religious principles. The first commander of the German sociologist Max Weber in the work “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism”, published at the beginning of the nineteenth century.
Weber did not take into account, inter alia, the effect of cheap money in the economy. From the sixteenth century, that is, about the same time when we began the Reformation, began colonization of America. Central and southern parts of the continent, which went to two Catholic countries: Spain and Portugal abounded in gold. They began to bring them to Europe in large quantities.
Some people they bring in, and others … have to earn. To get the gold in the Netherlands or England not enough to sail to America and bring the natives. It was necessary to offer such goods, inter alia, to the Spanish or Portuguese wished to pay for it. And that requires work, ingenuity, entrepreneurship. Economy to grow.
“In the words of George Gilder, four hundred years ago Spain, flooded flood of bullion from the mines in their colonies was as prosperous as it is today Saudi Arabia” – wrote Robert Gwiazdowski in the magazine “Forbes”. “Soon, however, fell into stagnation, while seemingly poorer parts of Europe, the industry flourished.”
As a result of work and development in the two centuries since the Reformation, many Protestant countries economically distanced Catholic power. But not because (or not only because) they were Protestant, but because they were busy were not given anything without effort.
Does religion have an impact on economic development and the Protestant countries actually have an advantage? Or is it the lack of religion releases extra energy?
The development in post-communist countries
testing ground for such analyzes can be post-communist countries created after the breakup of the Soviet Union . All start from a similar starting point, with the economic collapse, lack of capital. For 25 years, however, they developed in very different rates.
The change in the economy is affected of course by many factors: geographical location, climate, access to raw materials, water, education, labor, and military conflicts … with neighbors. We, in the context of the Holy Resurrection, we will focus on the religious aspect. set of shared principles has yet impact on how they act, people in the economy, and therefore on its dynamics .
And so, according to our calculations, 25 years after the collapse of the USSR the best earning in post-communist countries are Catholics. Taking into account the purchasing power parity (PPP – Purchasing Power Parity), average earnings weighted number of inhabitants there are 26 thousand. dollars annual income per person.
In this group of countries was also the highest nominal growth of income, which since 1990 has increased by an average of 18.6 thousand. dollars. In this respect inferior Catholics slightly one Protestant country, namely Latvia, and much more Orthodox Christians (14.3 thousand. Dollars of annual growth of income per capita PPP).
| Growth in groups of former communist countries by religion and GDP per capita in purchasing power parity | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| weighted average growth | |||||
| The weighted average GDP per capita | number of countries | 1990-2015 (dollars) | 2000-2015 (dollars) | 2015 -2020 (dollars) | |
| Catholics | 26046.2 | 4 | 18662.5 | 14197.3 | 7,508.6 |
| Protestants | 24619.7 | 1 | 18654.7 | 15821.7 | 8,371.5 |
| Orthodox | 21615.0 | 10 | 14332.5 | 15214.0 | 3,813.0 |
| Islam | 14496.3 | 4 | 9,152.8 | 9,756.7 | 3,448.3 |
| atheists / agnostics | 12784.5 | 3 | 4,898.0 | 6,483.6 | 3499, 0 |
| together | 20187.3 | 22 | 12987.8 | 13095.1 | 4,333.1 |
| Source: money.pl own calculations based on data from the World Bank and the IMF | |||||
The worst coped economically followers of Islam ( 9.2 thousand. dollar increase in per capita income) and atheists … (+4.9 thousand. dollars per capita growth).
Non-believers can be blamed on the tarnished its reputation for Ukraine, which population (45 million) dominated the category of “atheistic / agnostic.” Poorly governed by years Ukraine also is entangled now in a military conflict with Russia. In other atheistic countries: the Czech Republic (10.5 million inhabitants) and Estonia (1.3 million inhabitants), the situation is completely different.
Both belong to the richest set of 22 post-communist countries that freed themselves from communism after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Pace of development persist, however, Lithuania (22.7 thousand. Dollars increase in growth in per capita income in the years 1990-2015), and the Czech Republic (18.7 thousand. Dollars of income growth) also Poland (19.9 thousand. Dollars of income growth ).
| Growth in groups of former communist countries by religion and GDP per capita (PPP dollars current) | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| name | GDP per capita PPP 2015 (forecast IMF dollars) | GDP per capita PPP in 1990 (the forecast IMF dollars) | change 1990-2015 (%) | change 1990-2015 (dollars) | change 2000-2015 (%) | change 2000-2015 (dollars) | change from 2015 to 2020 * (%) | * change 2015-2020 (dollars) | Religion (percent of population) |
| Czech Republic | 31479.7 | 12731.2 | 147.3 | 18748.4 | 93.3 | 15192.8 | 22.5 | 7,084.3 | atheists / agnostics 54% Christians, Catholics 10% |
| Estonia | 28781.1 | 7324.6 (1) | 292.9 | 21456.4 | 133.1 | 16432.9 | 29.9 | 8,602.8 | atheists / agnostics 54%, Christian-Orthodox 16%, Christians-Protestants 11% |
| Lithuania | 28153.4 | 5468.5 (3) | 414.8 | 22684.9 | 303.2 | 21170.6 | 31.6 | 8,894.4 | Christians, Catholics 77%, atheists / agnostics 6%, Christian-Orthodox 4% |
| Polish | 26402.8 | 6529.3 | 304.4 | 19873.5 | 128.4 | 14843.1 | 30.8 | 8130.6 | Christian-Catholics 88%, atheists / agnostics 8% |
| Hungary | 26074.6 | 10937.9 | 138.4 | 15136.7 | 84.2 | 11922.0 | 23.6 | 6,159.1 | Christians, Catholics 39%, atheists / agnostics 18%, Christians-Protestants 14% |
| Latvia | 24619.7 | 5,965.1 | 312.7 | 18654.7 | 179.8 | 15821.7 | 34.0 | 8,371.5 | Christians-Protestants 34%, Christians, Catholics 25% |
| Kazakhstan | 24345.7 | 8,226.8 | 195.9 | 16118.9 | 216.5 | 16652.5 | 22.5 | 5,479.4 | Islam-Sunni Muslim 69%, Christian-Orthodox 24% |
| Russia | 23744.2 | 8,012.8 | 196.3 | 15731 4 | 247.9 | 16918.8 | 15.1 | 3,584.2 | Christians -prawosławni 42%, atheists / agnostics 13% |
| Croatia | 21324.4 | 8097.4 (2) | 163.3 | 13227.0 | 71.4 | 8880.3 | 19.3 | 4,114.1 | Christians, Catholics 73%, Christian-Orthodox 4% |
| Romania | 20697.8 | 5,192.9 | 298.6 | 15504, 9 | 262.7 | 14990.4 | 31.0 | 6,421.2 | chrześcijanie- Orthodox 81%, Christian-Catholic 8% |
| Bulgaria | 18501.9 | 9023.9 | 105.0 | 9,478.1 | 142.4 | 10870.6 | 25.0 | 4,626.4 | Christian-Orthodox 75%, Islam-Sunni 10% |
| Belarus | 17859.5 | 5,224.7 | 241.8 | 12634.8 | 208.7 | 12073.6 | 15.3 | 2,738.1 | Christian-Orthodox 48% atheists / agnostics 41%, Christian-Catholics 7% |
| Montenegro | 15716.6 | 6,614.7 (4) | 137.6 | 9,101.9 | 137.6 | 9101.9 | 26.5 | 4,162.6 | Christian-Orthodox 72%, Islam-Sunni 19% |
| Macedonia | 13938.6 | 5,320.1 | 162.0 | 8618 6 | 123.2 | 7,694.1 | 28.9 | 4,029.0 | Christians -prawosławni 65%, Islam 33% |
| Serbia | 13576.8 | 4920.7 (5) | 175.9 | 8,656.1 | 135.0 | 7,799.2 | 26.5 | 3,596.2 | Christian-Orthodox 85%, Christian-Catholic 5% |
| Albania | 11872.4 | 2,944.6 | 303.2 | 8927.8 | 180.9 | 7,646.6 | 37.0 | 4,393.3 | Islam Sunni-57 % Christians-Catholics 10% |
| Georgia | 9,566.2 | 5182 5 | 84.6 | 4,383.7 | 269.2 | 6,975.4 | 38 1 | 3,645.5 | Christian-Orthodox 84%, Islam 10% |
| Armenia | 8,432.5 | 2,414.4 | 249.3 | 6,018.1 | 264.5 | 6,119.1 | 27.0 | 2,274.3 | Christian-Orthodox 87%, Christian-Catholic 9 % |
| Ukraine | 7,989.6 | 6,780.3 | 17.8 | 1,209.4 | 109.6 | 4,177.5 | 31.5 | 2,520.5 | atheists / agnostics 63%, Christian-Orthodox 27% |
| Moldova | 4,998.8 | 4,162.2 | 20.1 | 836.6 | 170.8 | 3,153.0 | 28.7 | 1,433.7 | Christian-Orthodox 93% |
| Kyrgyzstan | 3,314.1 | 2,245.8 | 47.6 | 1,068.3 | 101.5 | 1,669.7 | 28.9 | 958.6 | 51% Islam, Islam-Sunni 19% |
| Tajikistan | 2,748.8 | 2,349.6 | 17.0 | 399.2 | 192.5 | 1,809.1 | 23.2 | 636.7 | Islam-Sunni 95%, Shi’a Islam-3% |
| Source: World Bank, IMF, CIA Factbook; PPP – PPP (Purchasing Power Parity); Forecast by the IMF; (1) The IMF, the value of 1993; (2) the IMF, the value of 1992; (3) Statistical Office of Lithuania data 1995, calculated according to PPP 2004; (4) The World Bank, a 2000 .; (5) The World Bank, given in 1995. | |||||||||
Dynamics of development of all head beats Lithuania. Most of its 415-percent growth rate has already reached the twenty-first century (303 percent.). The country has made good use of accession to the European Communities in 2004. In second place in the dynamics of development is Latvia, and Poland third.
In contrast to Lithuania, our country, however, after the accession to the EU has slowed significantly. Gros growth occurred in the early years – at this age, increase in per capita income was “only” 128 percent, while since 1990 year, up 304 percent.
With the best starting point competed atheistic Czechs. In 1990, its per capita income was the highest in the group of 22 countries and amounted to 12.7 thousand. dollars by purchasing power parity. At first they were for now, so that now their per capita income is up 31.5 thousand. dollars. In second place after the communist times were Catholic Hungarians, who have now fallen off the podium and are in fifth place.
Poland advanced the most in Lithuania
Our promotion from tenth place in terms of per capita income for the fourth shows a good way, which we adopted in reforming the country. But the most admirable is the promotion of Catholic Lithuania from the twelfth position in the third. Significant was also promoted Protestant Latvia – from eleventh to sixth and Orthodox Romania fifteenth to tenth.
Way to the other side made atheistic Ukraine, falling from eighth place in terms of wealth on the nineteenth, but also – and surprise surprise – orthodox Bulgaria. From the times of communism the country came in third place in terms of per capita income, it is now only on the eleventh, despite membership in the European Union. And it is time the EU is better than post-communist economic history of this country.
What’s next?
The International Monetary Fund has attempted to present forecasts of GDP growth per capita by PPP 2020. Poland has to give way here just three Baltic countries and the countries of Latvia, the only country in the Protestant statement, multiply is the fastest (8.4 thousand. Dollars). Catholics for four years to earn an average of 7.5 thousand. dollars a year more than in 2015. Least rise to Islamic countries (+3.4 thousand. dollars).
The rules have consequences and professed hierarchy of values is not without significance to the way human action. To the success of the country’s economic, it is necessary a lot of factors, but the main condition is to work, that is what people have attitude to perform their duties and their own development. Accepted in society generally religious influence on this and are reflected in the economy.
Lack of faith involves risk. It seems that it is safer to be a Catholic or a Protestant.
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