Are My Growth Predictions for 2030 Coming True? 2024 Data Update
Let’s check how accurate my predictions have been so far this year
Hi everyone,
In April 2024, I made bold predictions about which countries would climb the World Bank's income ladder by 2030. The summer of 2024 brought the first reality check — and some surprising results. Now, a full year later, the economic landscape has shifted dramatically. It's time to see which nations are defying expectations and which are falling behind.
The World Bank's Economic Scorecard
Every year in July, national statistical agencies within each country report their Gross National Income (GNI) per capita to the World Bank, which sorts nations into four categories:
The World Bank has four classifications:
Low Income:
Lower Middle Income
Upper Middle Income
High Income
Here are the income classification thresholds for each level, all calculated using market exchange rates:
These thresholds adjust annually for inflation using the IMF's Special Drawing Rights deflator—essentially keeping the goalposts moving with global economic reality.
Here’s a picture of the world showing countries by their classification.
The question is: Which countries are actually making the jumps I predicted?
My 2030 Predictions: The Climbers
From Low Income ($1,135) to Lower-Middle Income: I predicted that by 2030, only two countries have what it takes to escape the bottom tier—Ethiopia and Rwanda. While nations like DRC, Afghanistan, and Madagascar remain stuck, these East African economies are building momentum.
From Lower-Middle Income ($1,136-$4,495) to Upper-Middle Income: I'm betting on five countries to join the likes of Mexico and Brazil: Egypt, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Mongolia, and Vietnam. Meanwhile, I think countries like Honduras, Ghana, and Pakistan will remain lower-middle income past 2030.
From Upper-Middle Income ($4,496-$13,935) to High Income: The biggest prize goes to Bulgaria, Turkey, St. Lucia, China, and Costa Rica—countries positioned to cross the $13,935 threshold and join the developed world club.
Yes, that threshold seems absurdly low if you're reading this from America or Europe, but it's the global standard that separates developed from developing economies.
Why Market Exchange Rates, Not Purchasing Power?
Critics often ask: shouldn't the World Bank use Purchasing Power Parity instead of raw exchange rates? After all, $2,650 in India (India’s average income at market exchange rates) buys what $11,000 does in America (India’s average income at purchasing power parity).
The World Bank sticks with market exchange rates for three compelling reasons:
Real Money Flows: International trade, investment, and debt happen at market rates—not adjusted prices. A Turkish company buying German machinery pays the actual exchange rate, not some PPP-adjusted fantasy number.
Real-Time Transparency: Currency markets update every second. PPP calculations require armies of economists comparing hundreds of products across countries—hardly practical for live economic rankings.
Debt Reality: When countries borrow internationally, they repay in hard currency at market rates. PPP can't help you service dollar-denominated debt when your currency crashes.
How good have my projections been so far?
Early Winners
Three countries have already proven me right: Bulgaria, Mongolia, and Costa Rica crossed into higher income brackets ahead of schedule.
Rwanda and Ethiopia are on the right track.
Steady Climbers
Rwanda
Rwanda sits at $1,040 per capita—tantalizingly close to the $1,136 lower-middle income threshold. Even with annual inflation adjustments, they're on track to hit my 2030 target.
Want the full Rwanda story? I wrote a four-part deep dive:
Part III: The Rwandan Genocide, Kagame’s Rise, and the 1st Congo War
Part IV: Rwanda-Congo Past Issues to Present Day & Paul Kagame’s Tenure
Rwanda's economic engine runs on three cylinders: Selling Congolese minerals, tourism, and a dramatic infrastructure push—they've doubled electricity generation per capita in just nine years.
Ethiopia
Ethiopia doesn't even have a World Bank classification right now. After liberalizing its currency, the birr, economic data became too volatile to measure—the World Bank pulled both 2023 and 2024 estimates.
Ethiopia is currently doing an economic reform movement away from the government owning all key enterprises. The question is: Will it succeed like China's Gǎigé kāifàng or India's 1991 liberalization? Or collapse like Soviet perestroika?
Africa’s China—minus a coastline
The parallels are striking. Both Ethiopia and China are ancient civilizations with dominant ethnic cores (Amhara vs. Han), both escaped direct colonization yet suffered brutal imperialism, and both endured communist famines that killed millions. Now Ethiopia is attempting its own Deng Xiaoping moment under Abiy Ahmed.
Allow Foreign property ownership
Open Banking and retail to foreign competition
Relax Capital controls for profit repatriation
Privatize State owned enterprises
Launch Stock exchange (January 2025)
We will see if these policies help Ethiopia reach lower-middle income or if this is premature financial liberalization.
Reality Check with Ethiopia’s current issues:
Ethiopia has issues with internal politics, geopolitics, and business climate.
Internal rebellions rage in Oromia and Amhara. Ethiopia just finished quashing rebels in its Somali region (Ogaden) in 2018 and the Tigray region in 2022. Regional rivals—Egypt, Eritrea, & Somalia—have formed what amounts to an anti-Ethiopia alliance over port access disputes (Eritrea & Somalia’s concern) and the Ethiopia Dam (Egypt’s concern).
Business-wise, this country still has a license raj in many sectors, but my many Ethiopian friends are insanely confident in Ethiopia’s growth. Three of my friends bought property in Addis Ababa. I am not as confident as they are, but I am sure Ethiopia will be a lower-middle income country by 2030.
Vietnam
Vietnam will almost definitely be upper-middle income next year. As of 2024, Vietnam stands with an average income per capita at $4,490—just $6 shy of the World Bank's $4,496 benchmark. Barring major disruptions from potential Trump’s transshipment tariffs, Vietnam should cross this milestone when the year 2025 ends. Chinese manufacturers continue relocating production to Vietnam, drawn by lower labor costs and an established industrial base.
Vietnam is basically a “little China”. Just like how China had “Gǎigé kāifàng” (Reform and Opening Up) in 1978, Vietnam had “Doi Moi” (Renovation) in 1986.
Vietnam did similar reforms to what China did:
Dual Track Pricing: State set prices and Free market Prices for farmers
Household farming: Instead of farming for a cooperative where you were told what crops to grow, told what methods to pick and etc. Farmers were allowed to choose crops, pick crop methods, and sell where they want. Farmers were able to profit from their labor.
Private enterprise: Vietnam gradually allowed private firms to exist.
Foreign Investment: Vietnam's foreign investment journey began in 1987 with permitted private investment and made special economic zones.
There are some big nuances & differences between what China and Vietnam did in their market reforms, but that’s for another article.
Right now, Vietnam is a big hub for electronics, textiles, and more. So many companies are there such as Foxconn, GoerTek, Luxshare Precision Industry Co., Panasonic, Intel, and more.
Apple CEO Tim Cook in May 2025 said Vietnam will produce “almost all” of its iPads, MacBooks, watches, and AirPods for the U.S. market.
Beyond Apple devices and Nike shoes, Vietnam wants to get into AI. Vietnam’s biggest tech firm, Food Processing Technology (FPT Corp), is trying to become competitive in the AI sector. FPT provides IT solutions for self-driving cars and industrial robots.
In 2024, the firm made record-breaking $2.4B in revenue.
FPT is partnered with Nvidia to build AI data centers in Vietnam and Japan. It is also trying to compete with Nvidia by trying to do semiconductor chip design.
Besides foreign investment, Vietnam has some national champions like Vingroup and Hoa Phat. It is also now the third-most-visited nation in Southeast Asia, with 17.5M international arrivals in 2024, edging out Singapore (2nd place is Malaysia at 25M and Thailand is first at 35M).
The only big issue Vietnam has is its demographics. Vietnam has a below replacement fertility rate of 1.91 children per woman. The Communist Party of Vietnam does not like this nor does it want to rely on mass immigration for growth so it just abolished its two-child policy as of June 2025.
A semi-issue Vietnam has is its geopolitics with China. Unlike the Philippines, it seems Vietnam can negotiate better with China. After all, China and Vietnam held joint military drills in July 2025.
The Almost-High Income Club
Turkey, St. Lucia, and China are knocking on the high-income door—expect all three to cross the threshold soon.
The Setbacks
So far, I am missing badly on Bangladesh and Egypt—both have been sliding backward since 2022.
Egypt
Egypt's economy has a foreign exchange golden goose: Suez Canal tolls. Then Yemen's Houthis decided to play maritime militia in "solidarity" with Palestinians, turning the Red Sea into a shipping nightmare since 2023.
The damage:
Canal revenues crashed 60% in 2024 ($7B revenue burned)
Biden's bombing campaign? Failed. Trump's strikes? Abandoned.
With foreign currency reserves hemorrhaging, Egypt crawled back to the IMF for another $8 billion bailout—complete with the usual reform promises they'll probably ignore. More dramatically, the UAE bought Egypt's entire Ras El-Hekma coastline for $35 billion as a bailout to shore up Egypt’s foreign currency reserves, the largest foreign investment in Egyptian history.
Meanwhile, I completely slept on Morocco, which quietly leapfrogged Egypt while I wasn't paying attention.
Bangladesh
August 2024: After 15 years in power, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina fled to India as protestors stormed her palace. The uprising killed over 1,400 people and united unlikely allies—liberal students, factory workers, and devout Muslims.
I do not know the political economy of Bangladesh super well but here’s my understanding. Hasina followed the classic strongman playbook: personality cult, forced disappearances, rigged elections. Yet she delivered real gains—transforming Bangladesh into a garment export powerhouse while deftly balancing India and China.
Her fatal mistake? Despite great growth in previous years, 2024 was not a great year. Also, many really hated her quota system reserving one-third of government jobs for 1971 independence war veterans and their descendants—essentially guaranteeing positions for her Awami League loyalists.
When Students Revolt:
University protesters, angry over economic stagnation and corruption, targeted the quota scheme. Garment factories shut down, delaying orders for H&M and Zara. Even after the Bangladesh Supreme Court watered down the quotas, it was too late—the movement had become a revolution.
Nobel laureate Muhammad Yunus now leads an interim government until 2026 elections.
Now Trump's tariffs threaten Bangladesh's garment lifeline, adding economic uncertainty to political chaos.
Which countries have I been asleep on?
Morocco
So far, it seems that I completely underestimated Morocco. Morocco definitely has a chance of becoming an upper-middle income nation by 2030. Despite 30% youth unemployment, the kingdom is methodically building economic momentum.
Morocco's diversified portfolio:
World's largest phosphate producer
Africa's top car exporter (thanks to Stellantis and Renault’s foreign investment)
Continent's most visited destination (17.4M tourists, surpassing Egypt's 15.7M)
The energy transition offers Morocco's biggest opportunity. Wind farms now dot the landscape, and green hydrogen investments are accelerating.
Morocco's boldest bet? A $500 million gaming industry the King wants to expand dramatically, centered in disputed Western Sahara's Dakhla region.
Geopolitically, unlike Palestine, the Western Sahara conflict lacks global attention—only Algeria cares enough to back Sahrawi Arab independence through the Polisario Front.
The African Union recognizes Western Sahara, or the “Sahrawi Democratic Republic” as a sovereign state, but this will likely be ignored due to Trump’s big move in 2020.
In 2020, Trump made America recognize Moroccan sovereignty of Western Sahara in exchange for Morocco joining the Abraham Accords with Israel. France, Britain, and Spain followed suit. Now Sahrawi representatives sit in Morocco's Parliament.
With international backing, Morocco is building a $1 billion highway connecting Dakhla to Tangier—cementing territorial integration.
Another country I slept on was the Philippines and Argentina, but I’ll write about them another day.
Cape Verde
Cape Verde caught me completely off-guard, jumping to upper-middle income this year on the back of post-pandemic tourism recovery and massive remittance flows—it ranks in the global top 25 for money sent home by emigrants.
Here's a pattern worth noting: every African island nation except Madagascar and Comoros dramatically outperforms the mainland. Cape Verde, Mauritius, and Seychelles don't just beat Sub-Saharan Africa—they surpass all of North Africa in living standards.
The secret? Tourism is their oil. Cape Verde's economy runs 25% on visitor spending, creating a virtuous cycle of investment, jobs, and growth for a small population that mainland countries struggle to replicate.
What about other Countries over the last 10 years?
Other nations are improving but there’s also a troubling concern of countries that have declined in living standards/stagnating over the last 10 years (2014-2024).
Sub Saharan Africa (15): Burundi, Mozambique, Sudan, Sierra Leone, Chad, South Sudan(No data), Lesotho, Nigeria, Zambia, Angola, Congo-Brazzaville, Eswatini, Namibia, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon
Middle East & North Africa (10): Syria, Palestine, Yemen (no Data), Lebanon, Tunisia, Iran, Algeria, Iraq, Libya, Azerbaijan
Southeast Asia (3): Burma, East Timor, Laos
Latin America (5): Colombia, Brazil, Cuba (No Data), Venezuela (No data)
South Asia (3): Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sri Lanka
Conclusion
With the exception of Egypt and Bangladesh, it looks like I am on track so far. Let’s see what other countries will get their act together by 2030.
I don't think your forecast for Bangladesh will pan out.
I personally prefer ppp numbers, but unfortunately they are extremely unreliable. Whatever they do, they end up with terrible estimates especially they underestimate Japan, China but overestimate Russia and Turkey.