Global Competitiveness Report

Following from the World Economic Forum's report for 2010-11. For the UK see pages 338-9. The executive summary:

After having fallen four positions over the past two years, the United Kingdom moves up one spot to 12th place this year, with a stable performance. The country benefits from clear strengths, such as the efficiency of its labor market (8th), standing in contrast to the rigidity of many other European countries. The country continues to have sophisticated and innovative businesses that are highly adept at harnessing the latest technologies for productivity improvements and operating in a very large market (ranked 6th for market size). These are all characteristics that are important for spurring productivity enhancements. While somewhat improved since last year, the macroeconomic environment remains the country’s greatest competitive weakness, with deficit spending that must be reined in to provide a more sustainable economic footing going into the future.

The assessment is based on 12 "pillars" broken down into the following parent categories:

• Basic Requirements: Institutions; Infrastructure; Macroeconomic Environment; Health and Primary Education
• Efficiency Enhancers: Higher Education and Training; Good Market Efficiency; Labour Market Efficiency; Financial Market Development; Technological Readiness; Market Size
• Innovation and Sophistication Factors: Business Sophistication; Innovation

The devil in the details is that Britain ranks 72nd out of 139 for government wastefulness (p.373) and 89th on the burden of government regulations (p.374). It would be very interesting to compare these rankings with what they were before the Blair-Brown regime abandoned all fiscal restraint. 

Hat-tip Autonomous Mind.