Economy of Esthursia

Economy of the Union of Esthursia

Brough of Weskerby, the financial centre of Esthursia
Currency	Arian shilling (EAS, ʃ)
Fiscal year	1 February - 31 January
Trade organisations	IEF and UAS
Statistics
Population	131,718,405 (January 2022)
GDP	6.406 trillion IBU (nominal; Q1 2022 est.) 7.881 trillion IBU (PPP; Q1 2022 est.)
GDP growth	2.44% (2022) 3.14% (2023e)
GDP per capita	$48,620 (nominal; Q1 2022 est.) $59,838 (PPP; 2022 est.)
GDP by sector	agriculture: 0.8% industry: 18.4% services: 80.8% (2021 est.)
Inflation (CPI)	3.1% (year to February 2023)
Base borrowing rate	2.2%
Population below poverty line	7% in poverty (2018) 5.5% at risk of poverty or social exclusion (INS, 2022)
Gini coefficient	24.7 low (INS, 2022)
Human Development Index	0.947 very high (HDI, 2022) 0.903 very high (IHDI, 2022)
Labour force	70,171,270 (2022) 77.0% employment rate (2022)
Labour force by occupation	agriculture: 1.4% industry: 18.9% services: 79.7% (2018 est.)
Unemployment	2.9% (Q2 2022) 17.7% youth unemployment (15 to 24 year-olds; Q4 2021)
Average gross salary	ʃ491 / $773 weekly median (2021)
Main industries	List Aerospace Adminstrative and legal services Agriculture Automotives Chemicals Construction Consumer goods Defence equipment Education Electronics Energy Financial services Food and beverages Healthcare Hospitality and leisure Industrial equipment Information technology Media Pharmaceuticals and biotechnology Real estate Research and development Retailing Scientific equipment Telecommunications Tourism Transportation and logistics Utilities
Ease-of-doing-business rank	(Very easy, 2020)
External
Exports	$n billion (2021 est.)
Export goods	Manufactured goods energy pharmaceuticals chemicals beverages
Imports	~$n billion (2021 est.)
Import goods	Manufactured goods machinery defence equipment foodstuffs
FDI stock	Inward: ~$0.7n2 trillion (2020) Outward: $n2 trillion (2020)
Current account	$11.8 billion (2022)
Gross external debt	$1.881 trillion (2021)
Net international investment position	+$1.139 billion (2021)
Public finances
Public debt	69.8% of GDP (Q3 2022) $4.537 trillion (Q3 2022) 71.4% of GDP (Q3 2021) $4.605 trillion (Q3 2021)
Budget balance	$24.5 billion deficit (2022) -0.4% of GDP (2022) $45.7 billion deficit (2021) −0.7% of GDP (2021)
Revenues	48.1% of GDP (2022)
Expenses	48.5% of GDP (2022)
Economic aid	$71 billion (2022)
Credit rating	Harper and Harper: AA+ (Domestic) AAA (Foreign) AAA (T&C Assessment) Outlook: Stable Westman's: Aa1 (Stable) Northway Group: AA+ (Positive) Establishers: AAA (Stable)
Foreign reserves	$471.8 billion (31 January 2021)
Main data source: CIA World Fact Book All values, unless otherwise stated, are in US dollars.

The economy of Esthursia is a highly industrialised, mixed economy with a high degree of welfare and government intervention. The largest sector of Esthursia's economy is services at 80.8 percent, followed by manufacturing at 18.4 percent. Primary production - centrally agriculture - is 0.8 percent. Esthursia's economy has low levels of relative poverty and inequality, a large proportion in government spending of GDP, and extensive universal provision of utilities, such as education, healthcare, energy, water and housing. At a GDP of over 6 trillion UBI, it is a major regional economy of Auroria.

With respect to foreign trade, the key economic sectors are manufacturing, healthcare, education and energy. The largest industry by far is healthcare, followed by energy. Esthursia has extensive geothermal, wind and tidal energy reserves, while having considerable nuclear production, and exports nearly half of the energy it produces. The agricultural sector is particularly reliant on government intervention, although healthcare also remains primarily nationalised and centralised. The metropolitan areas of Brantley and Weskerby generate around a third of Esthursia's GDP. Finance also remains key to the Esthursian economy, although is diminishing as a proportion of the economy - particularly during the 2009-11 economic crisis - while remaining central in the city and capital of Weskerby.

High-technology manufacturing in Esthursia ranks particularly highly, meanwhile - due to high levels of investment out of Esthursia while inward investment is low - Esthursia remains a creditor nation. Short-term outlooks for the Esthursian economy remain bullish due to an extensive infrastructure and welfare programme aimed at redistribution, although domestic credit scores have been destabilised due to this. Esthursia has one of the largest information sectors, and its healthcare sector is by far the largest employer, followed by the education, finance and construction sectors.

Esthursia has not typically been heavily integrated with the world economy, however its recent entrance into the FSO, entrance to the Union of Aurorian States, bilateral relationships with other Ethian states, and increased participation in the global economy have increased trade markedly. Trade with the rest of the Union of Aurorian States represents over half of the country's total trade. Trade policy remains mainly under the jurisdiction of the Esthursian government. Esthursia has operated under its "arian shilling" since the Union's founding in 1508, and in totality since 1588, which remains independent and partially managed.

Government involvement is primarily exercised by His Highness's Chancellery, headed by the Chancellor of the Landsfere, and the Redery for Economic Affairs. Since 1926, management of the economy has followed a broadly Asmontian approach, especially in the wake of the late 1980s and 2010 crises. The Union Bank of Esthursia is the Union's central bank, and since 1916 its Minting Chamber has been responsible for setting interest rates, quantitative easing, and forward guidance.

History

1911-1926

The Esthursian economy in the early Edmundian era was the formation of decades of to-and-fro over state involvement and worker control. In 1911, the election of Neville Salisbury brought over a decade of Liberal government to an end, however did not heavily depart from its widely centre-right economic positions.

In 1916, Esthursia experienced a close call with a bank run in the Panic of 1916, in which the country narrowly avoided recession. During the course of the year, Salisbury's one-nation conservative government set up a central bank, as well as beginning the barebones of laws later scrapped by Thorne and replaced fully by Asmont that would guarantee verified banks' clients had a limited guaranteed payback. The Union Bank of Esthursia (UBE) was formed in the same year, a state-run central bank with independence over monetary policy, which has remained running for over a century since.

In 1922, Esthursia began a conflict with Scalvia. This conflict proved divisive and economically costly, thus the government sharply cut welfare, spending and wages to fund its military missions. Decades of gradual erosion of working rights and freedoms, and now falling wages and worsening conditions, drove many into striking, with a General Strike declared from December 4, 1922, until April 24, 1926. This strike, and latent issues with Esthursia's underproducing economy, caused it to fall into the greatest economic crash it has ever faced; living standards dropped markedly, and unemployment rose to 17%. This period is known as the War Crash, and ended when socialist and trade union leader George Asmont won the 1926 general election, ending 15 consecutive years of Conservative government.

1926-1950

The generation after the War is known as the Asmontian era, thanks to 18 of 24 years having Asmont as Forethane. George Asmont was a strong proponent of left-wing socialist economics, and seeing a key reason for Esthursia's economic hardship lying in its socioeconomic inequalities and lack of rights, his government's key priority was promoting economic growth through intervention.