World Bank Expects Economic Growth to Slow to Lowest Level Since Great Recession

The global economy will slow down dramatically in 2023 and 2024, according to the World Bank’s Global Economic Prospects report. “The world economy is in a precarious position,” said Indermit Gill, the World Bank Group’s chief economist, on June 6. “Outside of East and South Asia, it is a long way from the dynamism needed to eliminate poverty, counter climate change, and replenish human capital. In 2023, trade will grow at less than a third of its pace in the years before the pandemic.”

The World Bank Report projects global economic growth will fall from 3.1 percent in 2022 to 2.1 percent in 2023 as central banks keep interest rates high. It also predicts that global trade expansion will fall from 6.0 percent in 2022 to 1.7 percent in 2023. The situation may end up being even worse in the United States, with economic growth falling to 0.8 percent next year.

Spillover effects: After world leaders started the worst global recession since World War ii by locking down economies in the wake of the covid-19 pandemic, they started the worst inflation since the 1970s by handing out trillions of dollars in covid-19 stimulus money. Now they are trying to clean up the mess by raising interest rates until inflation comes down.

The plan seems to be working, but the higher cost of borrowing money puts a damper on economic activity. The National Bureau of Economic Research says there is a 67 percent chance the U.S. will enter a recession within the year.

Three of the top five biggest bank failures in U.S. history have occurred in the past 15 weeks, and many analysts expect the global economy to worsen in the months ahead.

Signature prophecy: Herbert W. Armstrong predicted that a financial crisis would destroy American power and prompt Europe to unite. Specifically, he warned that a banking crisis “could suddenly result in triggering European nations to unite as a new world power larger than either the Soviet Union or the U.S.” (co-worker letter, July 22, 1984). In other words, a banking crisis could destroy the global financial system, scare European nations into surrendering control to a central authority, and create a new world order wherein America is no longer the superpower. So the global economy bears examination.

Learn more: Read “How the Global Financial Crisis Will Produce Europe’s 10 Kings.”