According to Patrick’s proprietary model, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will experience respectable economic growth between 2010 and 2050. Ever since the early 90s, oil producing countries in the Middle East have been willing to invest their profits locally, in the middle of the Muslim world, instead of investing it in America, Europe or Japan. The result has been one of the fastest rates of development anywhere in the world. Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha are all developing at record pace and the economic activity is attracting immigrants from across the region.
The UAE will also enjoy relatively low levels of political volatility. Social unrest is highly correlated with “youth bulges” and that’s a problem the UAE doesn’t have. Most of the immigrants that come to Dubai or Abu Dhabi are past their early twenties and are in the middle of their careers. Growth is healthy so there are lots of job opportunities available. Everybody’s making money and the result is a politically stable environment.
The population of the United Arab Emirates is expected to grow by 77% between 2010 and 2050. That’s more than any other country studied by this model with the exception of Nigeria. The country also has an extremely active import / export sector and is running a trade surplus as a result of their oil production. The government gets lots of money from their oil exports and that will allow the UAE to build state-of-the-art infrastructure to support the private sector economic development, which will inevitably attract even more. It all adds up to a very healthy environment for business and economic expansion.
The graphic below is fascinating. The accelerated population growth in the UAE isn’t coming from domestic families having more children. Most of it is coming from immigration, so you can see this disproportionate working population and a “youth deficit” as well as relatively few older retired people at the same time. People tend to be productive and healthy during the middle part of their lives, so the UAE is getting more productivity per capita than any other country studied by this model. Everybody is working. We can expect continued development and expansion coming from the United Arab Emirates for the foreseeable future.
Patrick is an award-winning author and keynote speaker who can speak about demographic trends affecting the United Arab Emirates at conferences and business events in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Doha or other UAE destinations.
DISCLAIMER: Projected results are NOT guaranteed. The forecasts for the United Arab Emirates above were calculated based on projected population data obtained from the World Bank website. The economic forecast used this demographic data along with adjusters for net exports, relative age distribution and per capita income projections. The political volatility forecast used the same demographic data along with adjusters for youth population percentage, projected economic growth and public government debt level. Please see the model methodology for more details.
Patrick Schwerdtfeger maintains a video blog entitled “Strategic Business Insights” and adds new videos on a regular basis. Some of the videos are ‘macro’ covering topics like global business trends and geopolitical dynamics. Others are ‘micro’ covering communication skills and your mental mindset. Access them here:
All of the countries covered by the economic forecasting model are ranked below. They are each linked to the country’s respective page, so please feel free to explore other countries you might be interested in.
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