Prime Minister Donald Tusk recently reported that Poland has joined the group of groups. This means that we are among 20 countries around the world, whose GDP is USD 1 trillion. However, is there really something to enjoy and is it not just fun with data?
Poland has become a group
According to Tusk, the annual value of the Polish gross domestic product (GDP) is 1 trillion USD. So we are among 20 countries with such a result. At least, this is due to the GUS report regarding GDP for the second quarter of 2025, on the basis of which, according to RP.pl, Andrzej Kubisiak, president of the Polish Economic Institute, “can be calculated by its cumulative value for the last four quarters”.
If someone immediately wants to shout that it is probably propaganda, I will add that it is convergent with what the International Monetary Fund provided, which estimated Poland’s GDP at approx. USD 980 billion. We are supposed to beat more records ahead of us.
It is worth adding that only 19 countries achieved such success before us. In 1969, the US did this, in 1978. Japan, in 1986 Germany (Germany), and two years later France. In the years 2006–2007 as many as five countries entered this elite club, including China.
About how it succeeded and what is ahead of us, in a moment. Let’s enter the controversy field for a moment.
GDP, or what?
First, theory: GDP (gross domestic product) is one of the basic measures used in economics to assess the size and condition of the economy of a given country. This is the total value of all final goods and services produced in the territory of a given country at a specified time (most often during the year or quarter). “Final” means that only good and services bought by the final consumer are important. It is important to avoid multiple counting.
How does GDP count? There are three basic methods:
- Production method (added value) – added value generated by all sectors of the economy (agriculture, industry, services): added value = Production value – the value of used intermediate goods,
- Income method: here GDP is the sum of all income obtained in the economy: remuneration, enterprise profits, indirect taxes (e.g. VAT, excise duty) minus subsidies,
- Expense method (most often used in practice): here the PKB = C + I + G + (X – M) pattern is used, where C – private consumption, I – investments, G – government expenditure, x – export, M – import.
Is GDP the best economic development indicator? Certainly, GDP is very useful because it allows you to compare countries and measure the growth rate of the economy, but is not an ideal development rate. Certainly, the downside is that it does not measure the quality of life or the well -being of citizens. Nor does it show how income is separated. For example, GDP can grow, and with it unevenness – capital is becoming more and more unevenly.
GDP also does not include the gray zone and free work (e.g. home care) and ignores environmental issues – GDP growth can go hand in hand with the degradation of nature.
As you can see, GDP growth does not reflect a full picture of the country’s situation. That is why other measures are used more and more often next to GDP. For example, GDP per capita (per capita) shows how capital spreads into citizens and how rich, for example, an average Pole is rich. Added to this is Gini, an indicator that shows the level of unevenness. Analysts also examine the quality and satisfaction with the lives of citizens.
We still have a lot to do
Armed with this knowledge, we can see a new success (because it is a success) rulers in a new light. Poland in the “head” GDP category is already worse. When the value given before the Central Statistical Office is converted into the number of inhabitants, taking into account the price level and inflation, it turns out that we are not 20th, but only 35th place on the globe.
Gini also shows that it is not at all cheerful, at least not everyone. The inequality rate reaches 0 when all people have the same income and 1, when all people except one have zero income. The last CSO reading regarding 2024 and then it was 0.300 (a year earlier – 0.314).
Let’s look at the data from the study Satisfaction with life in 2024. General satisfaction with life was declared in it, as CBOS said, eight out of ten respondents. This is the highest percentage in the last four years.
When you get deeper into the report, the matter is more complex. Poles declared that they were satisfied with their place of residence (87%), social relations (84%) and their children (74%). However, it was worse in the case of income: only 38% of respondents declared their satisfaction with them, dissatisfaction – 19%, 40% of people said that they were medium satisfied with how much they earn.
How did it work?
The above data show that the image of how you live in Poland is complex. It is worth enjoying, however, that even in terms of GDP everything goes in the right direction. It is a success of both Polish entrepreneurs and employees.
It is also worth adding that all this would not have been possible were it not for economic changes after 1989 – rejecting socialism, opening to foreign investments, then joining NATO (this increased the security of the country – more than that in a moment), and finally to the European Union allowed to strengthen Poland. The demographic hill, a very good global situation and the lack of wars in the region, overlap.
What next?
However, this description suggests that it may be worse in the future. While the demographic collapse is distributed to us by the surge of the population from Ukraine, so the violation of the world order by China and their allies can be potentially dangerous. The point is that the current geopolitical order was maintained by the USA. Poland used this – in Central Europe there were no war, and thus the companies willingly invested here. Now this global order is falling apart.
Paradoxically, the period of world turmoil could be used in their favor – Polish political elites seem to have no idea.
The technological backwardness of the Polish economy is applied. It is not just about not using the blockchain revolution by us, which we often write at bitcoin.pl, but also the lack of developing artificial intelligence. Polish politicians behave as if they wanted us to remain a European assembly plant, while we should follow in the footsteps of China, which from the production country becomes a place where we work on new technologies, and soon it can and will start earning more on margin (which was built by the US).
To sum up, it’s good, but it can be better. Of course, it is unrealistic to catch up with the US and China, but throwing a glove, for example, Saudi Arabia (USD 1.12 trillion), the Netherlands (USD 1.33 trillion) or Turkey (USD 1.4 trillion USD) seems even at your fingertips. However, many will depend on our further steps on the geopolitical chessboard and the maturity of our political elites. The latter is today, moreover, the largest Achilles heel of Poland.
