Amid Improving GNI Ranking
South Korea came in 12th, overtaken by Russia, in the global GDP ranking, but moved up from 45th to 31st in the global per-capita GNI ranking last year.
According to the World Bank, South Korea’s GDP totaled US$1.5308 trillion last year. It took the 14th place from 2009 to 2013 before moving up to 13th in 2014 and 11th in 2015.
Last year, the list was topped by the United States (US$19.3906 trillion), followed by China (US$12.2377 trillion), Japan (US$4.8721 trillion), Germany (US$3.6774 trillion), Britain (US$2.6224 trillion), India (US$2.5975 trillion), and France (US$2.5825 trillion). Russia (US$1.5775 trillion) took the 11th place by beating South Korea.
When it comes to the GNI per capita, South Korea rose to 31st with US$28,380. Likewise, it moved up from 48th to 31st with US$38,260 in terms of PPP-based GNI per capita. According to the Bank of Korea, the former upward movement has to do with foreign exchange rate factors and the latter may be because of its inflation rate lower than those of other countries.
The Isle of Man, a tax haven and self-governing British Crown dependency in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland, topped the per-capita GNI list with US$82,650. It was followed by Switzerland (US$80,560) and Norway (US$75,990). In PPP-based GNI per capita, Qatar won the first place with US$128,060, followed by Macao (US$96,570) and Singapore (US$90,570).