China to Rank World's Biggest Economy by 2028

The Economics and Business Research Center announced Today that China, will overtake the United States to become the world’s biggest economy in 2028, due to the contrasting recoveries of the two countries from the COVID-19 pandemic.

China looked set for average economic growth of 5.7% a year from 2021-25 before slowing to 4.5% a year from 2026-30.While the United States was likely to have a strong post-pandemic rebound in 2021, its growth would slow to 1.9% a year between 2022 and 2024, and then to 1.6% after that, according to the report.

Moreover, Japan would remain the world’s third-biggest economy, in dollar terms, until the early 2030s when it would be overtaken by India, pushing Germany down from fourth to fifth.

In contrast, Europe accounted for 19% of output in the top 10 global economies in 2020 but that will fall to 12% by 2035, or lower if there is an acrimonious split between the EU and Britain, the CEBR said.

Despite a hit in 2021 from its exit from the European Union’s single market, British GDP in dollars was forecast to be 23% higher than France’s by 2035, helped by Britain’s lead in the increasingly important digital economy.

Noteworthy, Chinese President Xi Jinping reported last month, it was “entirely possible for his economy to double in size by 2035 under his government’s new Five-Year Plan, which aims to achieve “modern socialism in 15 years.