Media ReleaseNobel Laureates call on G8 to focus on Economic FreedomCONTACTS:Release Date: 25 June 2002 CALGARY, AB — If the G8 is serious about fighting global poverty and terrorism, it needs to focus on promoting economic freedom, say Nobel Laureates in economic sciences Milton Friedman and Gary Becker. The Economic Freedom of the World: 2002 Annual Report, is being released at a news conference today in Calgary by Fraser Institute Executive Director Michael Walker. Walker, along with Professor Friedman, initiated the Economic Freedom project. "Economic freedom has been gaining ground around the world," Walker said. "This has spurred a worldwide increase in wealth, unprecedented poverty reduction, and an impressive lowering in inequality, as numerous peer-reviewed, fact-based research papers have shown." This 6th global economic freedom report, by James Gwartney and Robert Lawson, ranks 123 nations on 37 variables with data back to 1970. Economic freedom is based on personal choice, voluntary exchange, freedom to compete, and protection of the person and property. This requires the rule of law, property rights, limited government intervention, freedom to trade, and sound money. The first report was published in 1996 after a decade long research project, involving over 100 top scholars including several Nobel Laureates. The report is published by The Fraser Institute, the US-based Cato Institute, and a network of independent institutions in 54 other nations. "Economic freedom advances economic growth, reduces poverty and promotes other civil and political freedoms," Friedman said. "It is also a tonic against terrorism because of the opportunity it creates. All of the nations behind global terrorism lack economic freedom." Nations that score in the top fifth of the economic freedom rankings have an average per capita income of US$23,450 and average economic growth of 2.6 per cent a year; compared to an average per capita income of $2,560 and negative economic growth of 0.9 per cent in nations that score in the bottom quintile. Empirical studies have examined the question of whether wealth causes economic freedom or whether economic freedom causes wealth and economic growth. These studies show that causation flows from economic freedom to superior economic outcomes. Africa's persistent poverty is not due to a lack of foreign aid - African nations are the largest aid recipients - but to a lack of economic freedom on the continent. Economic freedom is also positively correlated with low poverty rates, superior health outcomes, literacy, good nutrition, low levels of child labour, civil and political freedoms, superior rankings on the United Nations Human Development Index, and low levels of corruption along with other positive results. "The series of reports on economic freedom," Professor Becker said, "has been of enormous value in assessing changes in these crucial freedoms, and in the consequences of freedom for economic progress of different nations. I look forward to each annual report with the latest information on countries that have made significant progress and on others that have fallen back." Key results from the 2002 report
News Conference
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