The city-state ranks in the top ten for GDP per hour, leaving the rest of the Asia Pacific region in the dust.
Apparently, there is little to no thumb-twiddling in Singapore offices, as worker efficiency has become world-class.
A graphic released by Visual Capitalist on Monday using 2023 International Labor Organization (ILO) data shows that employees in the city-state placed ninth by earning $76 an hour.
Financial Hub Benefits
The measure used a hypothetical 2017 international dollar adjusted for purchasing power.
Some interesting takeaways were that not only did the city-state leave the rest of the region in the dust, with Australia and Taiwan distant has-beens at 18th and 21st, but that it is starting to derive clear, secular benefits from hub status for wealth management and family offices.
Luxembourg Places First
That was indirectly confirmed by the fact that Luxembourg, with its outsized international financial sector, placed a strong first at $146 while Switzerland barely managed to keep its nose in front of Singapore with a sixth-placed ranking and a thin $2 advantage in GDP per hour ($76).
In fact, a separate graphic showing annual GDP per capita shows the city-state as being far in front of Switzerland, placing a joint second with $134,000 against the latter’s $92,000 and seventh rank.
Not So Much Asia
The rest of the region was largely a no-show in the aforementioned visualization, although gambling hub Macau made a surprising, or not so surprising appearance, coming in second worldwide with the same per capita GDP as Singapore, as did Ireland.
One thing that is interesting in the statistics is that small seems to be much, much better than big. According to Visual Capitalist, only two countries or territories in the top 14 in 2024 had a population of more than 10 million.
