The amount of government spending on education allows us to understand what priorities this or that country sets before itself. However, comparing only the absolute amounts of budget expenditures can be misleading.
The leading positions in the world ranking are occupied by small island states. Kiribati spends 16.4% of GDP on education, Tuvalu - 12.9%, Federated States of Micronesia - 11.6%.
Among the large countries, Namibia, which spends 9.1 percent of GDP on education, and Algeria, 9.0 percent, stand out. This proves that the high level of investment in education is characteristic not only of rich countries.
If we look at the world's 40 largest economies, Sweden is in first place, which allocates 7.3 percent of GDP to education, Naked Science reported. It is followed by Denmark (6.4 percent) and Belgium (6.3 percent). Great Britain (5.9 percent), Brazil (5.6 percent), the United States (5.4 percent), and South Korea (5.4 percent) are also among the largest education spender economies.
The level of economic development by itself does not explain differences in spending on education. Among the world's largest economies, there are countries that spend a lot of money on education, as well as states with relatively modest budgets.
Sweden and Denmark, for example, spend more than 6 percent of their GDP on education, while Singapore spends only 2.2 percent, Ireland 2.9 percent, and Japan 3.3 percent.
Some developing countries invest an even larger share of their economy in education than many wealthier nations. For example, Brazil allocates 5.6 percent of GDP for these purposes, and South Africa - 6.0 percent.
