The world’s freest economy is Singapore, followed closely by Switzerland.
That’s according to the 2023 edition of the Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom.
The bad news is that there are only four nation that enjoy “free” economies.
The worse news is that the global average for economic freedom has declined.
Here are some highlights (or lowlights) from the Index‘s executive summary.
The 2023 Index…reveals a world economy that, taken as a whole, is “mostly unfree.” Regrettably, the global average economic freedom score has fallen from the previous year’s 60.0 to 59.3—the lowest it has been over the past two decades. …fiscal soundness has deteriorated significantly.
…only four countries (down from seven in the previous year) recorded economic freedom scores of 80 or more, putting them in the ranks of the economically “free;” 23 countries earned a designation of “mostly free” by recording scores of 70.0 to 79.9… On the opposite side of the spectrum, more than 50 percent of the countries…have registered economic freedom scores below 60. …and 28 countries, including China and Iran, are in the economically “repressed” category.
American readers may be wondering about the United States.
Sadly, the US only ranks #25, which is lower than many European welfare states (which generally have higher fiscal burdens, but are more market-oriented in areas like trade and regulation).
What’s especially depressing is that the United States was economically “free” less than 20 years ago.
It’s also depressing that the United Kingdom has suffered a big fall as well.
In a column for RealClearMarkets, Rainer Zitelmann comments on declining economic liberty in the US and UK.
The United States is in imminent danger of dropping out of the Index of Economic Freedom’s “mostly free.” …In the latest ranking, the U.S. only just scrapes into the second-best of the five categories (“mostly free”). If the United States were to lose just one more point in next year’s ranking, it would find itself in the “moderately free” category…
The U.S. has progressively dropped down the rankings in recent years. There are now a total of 16 European countries that are economically freer, i.e. more capitalist, than the United States, such as Switzerland, Ireland, Estonia, Luxembourg, Denmark and Sweden. Even Germany and Austria are considered economically freer than the U.S. …Great Britain has already slipped out of the “mostly free” category and into the “moderately free” group of countries. With its score of 69.9 points, Great Britain has the worst rating since the Index was first calculated way back in 1995. In 2006, Great Britain was still on a respectable 80.4 points!
I’m very disappointed that Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden have all contributed to America’s deteriorating score. A bipartisan mess.
Just like the bipartisan mess in the United Kingdom – thanks to Blair, Brown, Cameron, May, Johnson, and Sunak.
Reagan and Thatcher must be rolling over in their graves.
P.S. I’m not surprised that North Korea is the most economically “repressed” nation, followed by Cuba and Venezuela.
International Liberty 
I’ve noticed that many “libertarians” assume that belief in the existence of political and economic and social and spiritual conspiracies negates the idea of the existence of ideas like Austrian economics. This need not be the case at all. It is my belief that the criminal conspirators understand economics better than anyone else, even than the supposed Austrian School experts. Because they are able to apply their superior knowledge towards their wicked and evil desired end, of fleecing the world and controlling it.
The causes for excessive government handouts are obvious! People in power want to stay in power!
All political parties plus their elected officials and their associated bureaucrats want to stay in power forever, so as not to give up their little piece of Shangri-la. This staying in power for extended periods destroys the concept of having an actual representative government.
The most successful, representative, and productive Congress ever to be seated in this country was this country’s 1st Congress. George Washington warned us about FACTIONS which is just another term for those individuals who hold down long-term assignments to positions of power within government, political parties, sub-parties plus the permanent bureaucracy (Kings men & women of old) all incorporated into the modern and very descriptive term “Washington DC Swamp Creatures”.
All members of our Congress must have equal power with equal seniority meaning restricting their terms in office whether that be an elected person or a bureaucratic position with their terms in a particular position being extremely limited. This concept of equal power by random selection is even more important for all leadership positions and committee assignments.
Total combined time, in a citizen’s lifetime, to be allowed in combined government (city, county, state and federal) employments (elected and bureaucratic) should never be over ten years in a lifetime. The cause for excessive government handouts is obvious! People in power want to stay in power!
All political parties plus their elected officials and their associated bureaucrats want to stay in power forever, so as not to give up their little piece of Shanri-la. This staying in power for extended periods destroys the concept of having an actual representative government.
The most successful, representative, and productive Congress, ever to be seated. in this country was this country’s 1st Congress. George Washington warned us about FACTIONS which is just another term for those individuals who hold down long-term assignments or positions of power within government, political parties, plus the permanently employed bureaucrats (Kings men & women of old). All these FACTIONS are now incorporated or permanently ensconced within America’s present-day form of government and now properly described as “Washington DC’s Swamp Creatures”.
All members of our Congress must have equal power and equal seniority meaning restricting a change in our constitution to restrict terms or length of stay with in any government position whether that be an elected person or a bureaucratic position with their length of terms within a particular position being extremely limited. This concept of equal power by random selection is even more important for leadership positions and committee assignments.
Total combined time, in a citizen’s lifetime, to be allowed in combined or total government employments (city, county, state and federal) whether (elected and bureaucratic) should never be over ten years in a lifetime.
USA in decline & 13 points behind #1 @ #25 😢
I’m pretty sure the vast majority of Democrat voters don’t ever consider this, really have no idea why this matters, believe it doesn’t matter & just don’t care about this 😒
“I’m very disappointed that Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden have all contributed to America’s deteriorating score. A bipartisan mess. Just like the bipartisan mess in the United Kingdom – thanks to Blair, Brown, Cameron, May, Johnson, and Sunak.”
It’s not that people don’t want freedom. The problem is and has always been that every nation has conspiracies within it that seek to advance their selfish cause, usually by manipulating and if possible controlling the apparent “government.”
The power and influence of these conspiracies is not constant or static. The ability of the conspiracies to get what they want fluctuates, and the reason we’re in our present global crisis is the small conspiracies have metastasized in to one great big fat giant Global conspiracy. What else do you call people who are as full of excrement and vile maliciousness as these Globalist @$$-klowns besides criminal conspirators?
It’s proper to call it “conspiracy” because they are not completely candid about their intent, they only drop hints for those who are paying attention and are willing to believe the truth.
And, yes, of course the Globalist conspiracy is non-partisan. It only plays at partisan politics to blow smoke up are behinds.