How common is homelessness across the world?

For decades, the World Values Survey and European Values Survey projects have examined people’s values through their surveys. One of the questions on trust asks: “Generally speaking, would you say that most people can be trusted or that you need to be very careful in dealing with people?”

This chart shows the share of respondents who answered “most people can be trusted” across different countries.

As you can see, reported trust in others varies widely from country to country. In the Nordic nations, over 60% of respondents believe most people can be trusted, while in France and Italy, this figure drops to around 26%. At the lower end, as few as 5% of people in countries like Colombia and Peru express trust in others.

It’s worth noting that interpretations of survey-based “trust” measures are complex: what people mean when they answer this question could reflect various ideas about trust, personal experiences, or cultural attitudes toward trustworthiness.

Explore trust levels for all countries →

The decline in manufacturing jobs — such as those in factories or industrial plants — often draws significant attention in political debates and media reports in the US, especially when tied to discussions about trade policies, globalization, or job losses in key industries.

This focus can sometimes overshadow that manufacturing jobs are already a relatively small part of the labor market. In the US, for example, they account for less than 10% of total employment.

The chart shows the evolution of manufacturing as a proportion of total employment in the US and five other rich countries, using estimates compiled by the UN.

Across all countries, manufacturing employment has declined. In the US, it fell from 13% in 2000 to just below 10% in 2022. Even in Germany, where it is the highest among this group, manufacturing is now down to less than 20%.

Explore the data on the share of manufacturing jobs in other countries →

China’s patent applications have grown rapidly in recent decades, as shown in the chart. Chinese applications surpassed US applications in 2010, reaching over 1.4 million in 2021. According to this data from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), China’s applications accounted for more than half of the global total in 2021.

In contrast, patent applications in the US have seen little growth in recent years, while in Japan, filings have steadily declined since 2000.

Innovations are patented due to economic incentives. A patent protects the invention to the owner for a limited period, often 20 years. This is why policymakers and researchers frequently compare annual patent filings across countries — new patents are considered a proxy for the pace of innovation.

However, patents are just one aspect of innovation. A country’s innovation system is shaped by a complex network of research, development, and commercialization, and patent applications are just one part of this broader process.

Read more about technological progress →

Immigrants without legal status are only a small fraction of the total immigrant population in most rich countries.

For example, just 7% of immigrants in the United Kingdom lack legal status. It’s 4% in Germany and less than 2% in the Netherlands. The United States stands out, with 22% of its immigrant population lacking legal status — that’s about one in five.

The estimates of immigrants without legal status come from the Measuring Irregular Migration (MIrreM) project and are for one specific year between 2017 and 2023. The total immigrant numbers are from the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (2020).

Explore data on immigration for more countries →

Fish stocks have a “maximum sustainable yield” — this is the point at which you can catch the largest amount of fish without affecting their total population over the long term. In other words, it means catching as many fish as possible without shrinking the population.

A fish is defined as “overexploited” if it is caught faster than the maximum sustainable yield.

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations estimates that around one-third of the world’s assessed fish stocks are overexploited. This chart shows that this share has increased over time.

Many regions have formal assessments of fish stocks and catch rates to provide updated estimates of overfishing. However, many fish stocks across Africa, Asia, and South America are not frequently and rigorously assessed. To get global estimates, the UN FAO combines these formal assessments with expert opinion and extrapolations based on what national and regional-level data is available.

The UN FAO’s report — The State of World Fisheries and Aquaculture 2024 — provides more detailed breakdowns of which species are overexploited or fished sustainably.

Explore more data and research on overfishing →

When asked where public spending should be reduced most, around 60% of people in the UK suggest cutting foreign aid.

However, people overestimate how much the UK spends on aid: last year’s UK Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses show that overseas aid amounted to £5.1 billion — just about 74 pounds per person.

As the chart shows, this is a tiny part of public spending, making up only 0.5% of the total budget.

To put this in perspective, the UK spends much more on other areas: over eight times as much on public order and safety, ten times more on defense, and forty times more on each of the two biggest expenses: health and welfare.

Spending is not much higher if we also consider funds dedicated to supporting refugees in the UK itself.

This situation is not specific to 2023: the UK’s foreign aid spending has been at similar levels for decades and is in line with what other wealthy countries spend. Compared to the size of its budget and economy, foreign aid is a relatively small expense.

Explore spending on foreign aid in the UK and other countries →

Homelessness is defined differently around the world, making it difficult to compare the issue across countries.

The map shows the forms of homelessness included in country statistics, as recorded by the Institute of Global Homelessness.

Sources distinguish three broad forms of homelessness: people with no accommodation who sleep in the streets or public spaces; people in temporary accommodation, such as emergency shelters; and people in severely inadequate housing, such as tents or slums.

Country statistics vary in which forms they include, with some countries focusing on just one type while others cover multiple combinations. Many sources do not provide enough details to know which forms of homelessness they refer to.

Despite these challenges, the data on homelessness has recently improved. The Institute of Global Homelessness has collected data on the completeness of national statistics, and the OECD has worked on making the statistics of their members comparable by using the same definitions of homelessness across them.

Learn more about the challenges of measuring homelessness →