Hong Kong has been the world’s freest economy for 25 consecutive years, but last year, the political and social turmoil caused by the “anti-China” movement made Singapore lose the top spot to Hong Kong. However, in the 2021 list released today (4), Hong Kong has been merged with China and directly removed from the “Economic Freedom Index”. Taiwan, on the other hand, has improved its “government integrity” score, jumping from 11th place in the world last year to 6th place this year.
The Heritage Foundation, a U.S. think tank, and the Wall Street Journal published the “2021 Index of Economic Freedom” report, which found that Hong Kong, like Macau, is now considered one of China’s leading economies. Like Macau, Hong Kong is now considered a part of China and no longer participates in the rankings independently. After months of “anti-China” pro-democracy protests in 2019, Hong Kong has become like a mainland Chinese city, with Beijing‘s manipulative intervention in Hong Kong’s policies increasing.
The authors of the study mention that while residents of Hong Kong and Macau have benefited from policies that provide greater economic freedom than mainland China, “the overall developments in recent years certainly suggest that these policies are ultimately dictated by Beijing.”
China ranks 107th this year, between Uganda and Uzbekistan, both of which are “largely illiberal” economies.
In this year’s latest list, Singapore maintained its No. 1 status with 89.4 points; only five countries received the Heritage Foundation’s “freest” rating, the other four being New Zealand, Australia, Switzerland and Ireland.
Taiwan has risen from 11th place in the world last year to 6th place this year, with a score of 78.6 points, an increase of 1.5 points from last year, mainly due to an increase in the “government integrity” section.
The report points out that Taiwan’s economic freedom ranks fourth among 40 countries in the Asia-Pacific region, and this year’s economic performance is the best in the 27-year history of the ranking, and the highest ever.
As Chinese Communist Party officials prepare to remove Hong Kong and Macau from the independent ranking as the National People’s Congress convenes in Beijing, and as China’s ranking falls far behind other large Asian economies such as Japan and South Korea, the report notes that this is partly because China is still dominated by large, opaque, government-linked companies.
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