Doing Business in 2006

I just read an interesting report called Doing Business in 2006: Creating Jobs. The World Bank published the report, and you can download it here. Here’s a description of the report:

Doing Business in 2006: Creating Jobs is the third in a series of annual reports investigating the regulations that enhance business activity and those that constrain it. New quantitative indicators on business regulations and their enforcement can be compared across 155 countries—from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe—and over time...The indicators are used to analyze economic outcomes and identify what reforms have worked, where, and why.

These are the top thirty economies based on the ease of doing business:

1 New Zealand
2 Singapore
3 United States
4 Canada
5 Norway
6 Australia
7 Hong Kong, China
8 Denmark
9 United Kingdom
10 Japan
11 Ireland
12 Iceland
13 Finland
14 Sweden
15 Lithuania
16 Estonia
17 Switzerland
18 Belgium
19 Germany
20 Thailand
21 Malaysia
22 Puerto Rico
23 Mauritius
24 Netherlands
25 Chile
26 Latvia
27 Korea
28 South Africa
29 Israel
30 Spain

Here are the top ten things that I learned from reading the report:

1. In Guatemala it takes 1,459 days to resolve simple disputes in court.

2. If you paid all your business taxes in Sierra Leone, you would pay 164% of gross profit.

3. Greece, ranked last of the OECD countries in this study, has an unemployment rate of 10.9%.

4. Entrepreneurs in Serbia and Montenegro can register new businesses online, and if the entrepreneur has not heard from the government in five days, the business can start.

5. In over half the world, new businesses are still required to announce their formation in a newspaper or official gazette.

6. The most difficult country to fire an employee is Angola.

7. Canada has the least rigid working hours. (It’s not clear if this is year round or just during hockey season.)

8. New Zealand, United States, and Afghanistan rank 1-2-3 in terms of the lowest cost to dismiss a redundant worker.

9. The mandatory retirement age for men in Greece is sixty-five. For women, it’s fifty eight.

10. It takes 363 days to register property in Bangladesh.

If you’re interested in worldwide conditions for entrepreneurs, you’ll find this report enlightening. Many thanks to Peep Laja for bringing it to my attention.

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Comments

[Berislav Lopac]

"It takes 363 days to register property in Bangladesh."

Bah! In Croatia it's 956 days, according to the same site. At least it's getting better due to recent reforms and updating of backlogs.

In any case, www.doingbusiness.com is a great resource, although their statistic can sometimes be dubious, as pointed by previous comments to this post. But you know how they say -- statistics is like women's underwear: what it shows is suggestive, but what it hides is what matters.

(BTW, Bjorn is a Scandinavian name, where it means "bear".)

[Marc Duchesne]

Well, shall I confess that I am French, living in France, and on the verge to create my own business(es) ?!!
France ranked #44 for the ease of doing business, just behind... Jamaica. Something wrong here, huh ?
Guess why I'm heading on the Silicon Valley ;-)
_Marc

[hirschi]

Several mistakes:
a) Greece is not ranked last (80 out of 155):
http://www.doingbusiness.org/EconomyRankings/

b) Greece does not have an unempolyment rate of 10.9%: its 9.7%
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Greece

c) According to the report there seems to be an "association" (whatever they want to prove) between unemployment and ease of doing a business. Its not a correlation and not statistical proven. By the way: statistics always lie (addendum: if you cant understand them ;-)

Germany has an unemployment rate of 12.1% in Jan 06 (average for the year 2006 is going to be 11.5%)
http://www.destatis.de/indicators/e/arb210ae.htm

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Greece is killing me. :-) It's the lowest of the OBCD countries. Made the change in the blog. As for not having the same figure as Wikipedia, well, I'll choose to believe the World Bank. :-)

Not sure who's "mistake" it is about correlation versus causation, but all I said was "Greece, ranked last of the OECD countries in this study, has an unemployment rate of 10.9%." How is correlation versus causation my mistake?

Thanks,

Guy

[Kuba Choinski]

Very interesting report, but it's sad that my country is ranked 54 - with many neighbors ranked in top 30. So I have an excuse, why starting my own business is so difficult and takes so much time ;-)
Thanks

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Kuba,

On the other hand, Poland dominates the market for page counters that reset every night!

Guy

[bjorn]

Interesting post as usual, but where did you find "Germany, ranked last in this study, has an unemployment rate of 10.9%."?
Germany is in place 19, which is perhaps not stellar, but far from last.

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Bjorn,

First, I didn't realize "Bjorn" was a German name! I'm glad you mentioned this. My mistake: it's Greece, not Germany. Those G countries all sound alike to me!

Thanks!

Guy

[Andy A.]

Great info! New Zealand is beautiful, I would have no problem moving there.