1. World Bank, 2020.

2. ILO, 2020.

3. IMF, 2020c.

4. Woetzel, et al, 2017.

5. ITU, 2020.

6. ITU, 2019.

7. World Economic Forum, 2020a.

8. ITU, 2020.

9. For a deep dive on how countries can update education systems to equip children with the skills of the future, see World Economic Forum, 2020c.

10. Huang, et al, 2020.

11. World Economic Forum, 2020b.

12. Patillo, et al, 2003.

13. Krahnke, 2020, and Marchesi and Masi, 2020.

14. Kharas, 2020.

15. Woetzel, et al, 2017.

16. IMF, 2020c.

17. Schwartz, et al, 2020.

18. IDC, 2020.

19. ITU, 2020.

20. Hsieh, et al, 2019.

21. World Economic Forum, 2020c.

22. World Health Organization, 2016b.

23. Slotkin, et al, 2020.

24. World Economic Forum, 2020d.

25. ITUC, 2017.

26. Looking at the United Kingdom, for instance, in 2018 only 1.1% of loans in banks’ portfolio were at risk of not being paid back, while in 2012, the figure was about 3.6%. Banks’ leverage (the ratio of assets [currency and deposits; debt securities; and loans]) – to equity declined from 103.3% to 46.6% from 2008–2018, and business leaders in 2019 considered British soundness of banks to have almost returned to pre-financial crisis levels.

27. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 2020.

28. Lazonick, et al, 2020, show that U.S. S&P 500 companies have engaged in an average of $400 billion open-market repurchases between 2010 and 2018. While banned or strictly reviewed by market authorities before the 80s for preventing companies from manipulating stock prices, they were liberalized in the 80s and 90s to fight hostile takeovers. Liberalization has, however, re-introduced price manipulation risks and diversion of liquidity from investments.

29. https://data.imf.org/?sk=E5DCAB7E-A5CA-4892-A6EA-598B5463A34C.

30. Florant, et al, 2020.

31. De Loecker, et al, 2020.

32. Author calculations based on OECD, Intellectual property (IP) statistics and analysis patents database, accessed June 2020.

33. Carlino and Kerr, 2014.

34. www.macmap.org/covid19

35. For instance, in the Eurozone supervisors have allowed banks to fully use capital and liquidity buffers, introduced flexibility in the criteria for loan classification and implementation of IFSR 9, and postponed the 2020 stress tests.

36. IMF, 2019.

37. IMF, 2020b.

38. IMF, 2020c.

39. Rousova, et al, 2020.

40. Carletti, et al, 2020.

41. This can be achieved either in a more direct way, banning open market repurchases altogether (as proposed by the recent “Reward Work Act”) or more mildly, by introducing closer supervision by stock market authorities (e.g. S.E.C.) with the possibility of charging companies that are found to manipulate the stock’s price (for more details on this, see for instance https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/opinion/ban-stock-buybacks.html).

42. KPMG, 2020.

43. World Economic Forum, 2019b.

44. EESC, 2020.

45. For more details on these conditions and a full description of the 20 markets of tomorrow refer to World Economic Forum, 2020e, https://www.weforum.org/reports/markets-of-tomorrow-pathways-to-a-new-economy.

46. Egger, P. et al. (2019).

47. Competition in network services is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how competitive are the provision of Network sector services (telecommunications, utilities, postal, transport, etc.?" [1 = Not at all competitive; 7 = Extremely competitive]; Collaboration between companies is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent do companies collaborate in sharing ideas and innovating?" [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]; Competition in professional services is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how competitive are the provision of Professional services (legal services, accounting, engineering, etc.?" [1 = Not at all competitive; 7 = Extremely competitive]; Competition in retail services is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how competitive are the provision of Retail services?" [1 = Not at all competitive; 7 = Extremely competitive]; Ease of finding skilled employees is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent can companies find people with the skills required to fill their vacancies?" [1 = not at all; 7 = to a great extent]; Government's responsiveness to change is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent does the government respond effectively to change (e.g technological changes, societal and demographic trends, security and economic challenges)?" [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]; Collaboration within a company is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent do people collaborate and share ideas within a company?" [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]; Venture capital availability is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how easy is it for start-up entrepreneurs with innovative but risky projects to obtain equity funding?" [1 = extremely difficult; 7 = extremely easy]; Social safety net protection is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent does a formal social safety net provide adequate protection to the general population (e.g., protection against job loss, disability, old age, poverty)?" [1 = Not at all - it doesn't provide any protection; 7 = To the full extent - provides full protection]; Soundness of banks is derived from responses to the question ““In your country, how do you assess the soundness of banks?” [1 = extremely low—banks may require recapitalization; 7 = extremely high—banks are generally healthy with sound balance sheets]; Business costs of crime and violence is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent does the incidence of crime and violence impose costs on businesses?" [1 = to a great extent—imposes huge costs; 7 = not at all—imposes no costs]; Judicial independence is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how independent is the judicial system from influences of the government, individuals, or companies?" [1 = not independent at all; 7 = entirely independent]; Organized crime is derived from responses to the question "In your country, to what extent does organized crime (mafia-oriented racketeering, extortion) impose costs on businesses? [1 = to a great extent—imposes huge costs; 7 = not at all—imposes no costs]; Extent of market dominance is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how do you characterize corporate activity?" [1 = dominated by a few business groups; 7 = spread among many firms]; Public trust of politicians is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how do you rate the ethical standards of politicians?" [1 = extremely low; 7 = extremely high]; Efficiency of train services is derived from responses to the question "In your country, how efficient (i.e., frequency, punctuality, speed, price) are train transport services?" [1 = extremely inefficient—among the worst in the world; 7 = extremely efficient—among the best in the world]; Country capacity to attract talent is derived from responses to the question "To what extent does your country attract highly skilled individuals from abroad?" [1 = not at all; 7 = to a great extent—the country attracts the best and brightest from around the world.

48. The analysis in this section, is based on the following Executive Opinion Survey indicators. Flexible work arrangements, derived from the question “In your country, to what extent do companies offer flexible working arrangements (e.g., virtual teams, remote working, part-time, employment)? [1=Not at all; 7= To a great extent]”; Digital skills among active population, derived from the question “In your country, to what extent does the active population possess sufficient digital skills (e.g., computer skills, basic coding, digital reading)? [1 = Not all; 7 = To a great extent]”; Social safety net protection, derived from the question “In your country, to what extent does a formal social safety net provide adequate protection to the general population (e.g., protection against job loss, disability, old age, poverty)? [1 = Not at all—it doesn't provide any protection; 7 = To the full extent—it provides full protection]”; Financing of SMEs, derived from the question “In your country, to what extent can small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) access the finance they need for their business operations through the financial sector? [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]”; Government ensuring policy stability, derived from the question In your country, to what extent does the government ensure a stable policy environment for doing business? [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]; Accessibility of healthcare services, derived from the question In your country, to what extent are women entering information technology roles (across all sector)? [1 = Not at all; 7 = To the full extent—the rate is equal to that of men]; University-industry collaboration in R&D derived from the question “In your country, to what extent do business and universities collaborate on research and development (R&D)? [1 = Not at all; 7 = To a great extent]”