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Data for 1820

Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison), 1820

1820, as GGDC’s 2023 release gives it · stored as published, never rewritten

Historical GDP per capita follows each country's output per person back to 1820, in 2011 international dollars, from the Maddison Project Database. It joins economic historians' reconstructions of old national accounts onto modern statistics, so that incomes two centuries apart can be set on one scale.

Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison), 1820 covers 54 countries. United Kingdom is highest, at 3,306; Nepal is lowest, at 641. The middle country reads 967.

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Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison) · Data for 1820

HighestUnited Kingdom

3,306

LowestNepal

641

Shaded by value in five groups of equal size, darkest at the better end.

01Position · derived

The table

Every country and every column of Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison), 1820, as published. GGDC ranks nobody on this measure; the position is derived here by ordering the published values. “=” marks a shared position.

Showing 25 of 54 countries · select a heading to sort

Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison), 1820: every country, as published by Maddison Project, Groningen Growth and Development Centre (GGDC).
derived
1United KingdomGBRNorthern Europe3,306
2NetherlandsNLDWestern Europe3,006
3United StatesUSANorthern America2,674
4ItalyITASouthern Europe2,523
5BelgiumBELWestern Europe2,358
6GermanyDEUWestern Europe2,041
7DenmarkDNKNorthern Europe2,031
8UruguayURYSouth America1,983
9AustriaAUTWestern Europe1,941
10FranceFRAWestern Europe1,809
11PortugalPRTSouthern Europe1,665
12ArgentinaARGSouth America1,591
13SpainESPSouthern Europe1,558
14CanadaCANNorthern America1,441
15SwedenSWENorthern Europe1,415
16IrelandIRLNorthern Europe1,398
17NorwayNORNorthern Europe1,384
18JapanJPNEastern Asia1,317
19FinlandFINNorthern Europe1,313
20South AfricaZAFSouthern Africa1,188
21Hong KongHKGEastern Asia1,132
22JamaicaJAMCaribbean1,117
=23LebanonLBNWestern Asia1,084
=23SyriaSYRWestern Asia1,084
25MexicoMEXCentral America1,007

02In 1820

At either end

The 5 countries at each end of the headline.

Highest

  1. 1United Kingdom3,306
  2. 2Netherlands3,006
  3. 3United States2,674
  4. 4Italy2,523
  5. 5Belgium2,358

Lowest

  1. 54Nepal641
  2. 51Tunisiashared685
  3. 51Moroccoshared685
  4. 51Algeriashared685
  5. 50North Korea753

A higher value is the better result. The middle country reads 967. “Shared” marks a value another country also holds.

03Caveats

Read before you use

Using the series

  • One-off estimates and partial territories

    Many rows here are estimates made for 1820 alone, with no figure for the nearby years, so they are not points on a yearly series. The Sources sheet also shows Indonesia's early series covering Java and South Africa's covering the Cape Colony, not today's territory.

  • One year of the 2023 release

    Every year in this series comes from GGDC’s 2023 release, recalculated on one method, so a change from one year to the next is not a revision. It can differ from what was first published for 1820.

  • 47 distinct values among 54

    Values are stored exactly as published, to 13 decimals. 4 countries share 877. Countries sharing a value share a position too.

  • Nothing missing

    Every one of the 54 countries has every column.

04The files

Download and cite

Licence in full

What this site changed: Reshaped to one row per country, with its ISO code; no value recalculated, rescaled or rounded. In full

Licence: CC BY 4.0 · what it allows, in plain words

Cite this edition

Maddison Project, Groningen Growth and Development Centre (GGDC) (1820). Historical GDP per Capita (Maddison), 1820 [data set], describing 1820. As held by Nations Inquiry, https://nationsinquiry.com/datasets/historical-gdp-per-capita/1820

05112 held

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