science

The Atlas of Economic Complexity

The Atlas of Economic Complexity is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The Atlas of Economic Complexity rather than just read about it. In short: The Atlas of Economic Complexity: Mapping Paths to Prosperity is a 2011 economics book by Ricardo Hausmann, Cesar A. Hidalgo, Sebastián Bustos, Michele Coscia, Sarah Chung, Juan Jimenez, Alexander Simoes and Muhammed A.

Key takeaways

The Atlas of Economic Complexity belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The Atlas of Economic Complexity to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The Atlas of Economic Complexity from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Atlas of Economic Complexity: Mapping Paths to Prosperity is a 2011 economics book by Ricardo Hausmann, Cesar A. Hidalgo, Sebastián Bustos, Michele Coscia, Sarah Chung, Juan Jimenez, Alexander Simoes and Muhammed A. Yıldırım. A revised 2014 edition is published by the MIT Press. The book attempts to measure the amount of productive knowledge that each country holds, by visualizing the differences between national economies. The book's originality is to go beyond standard statistics by making use of “complexity statistics” of 128 countries. The book concludes with hints "at how difficult and complex it may be for government planners to kick-start a new industry — while showing that there are new industries that will struggle to get started without help." The book is accompanied by two websites that host interactive visualizations and expand upon data featured in the book: MIT's and Harvard's. The Atlas was a collaboration between the Center for International Development at Harvard University and the Macro Connections group at the MIT Media Lab.

Online visualizations The visualizations presented in The Atlas were created in The Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC), a data visualizations engine created by Alex Simoes and Cesar A. Hidalgo in the Macro Connections group at the MIT Media Lab. The Observatory of Economic Complexity was launched in 2011. In 2013, Harvard's Center for International Development released an independent version of the platform, entitled The Atlas of Economic Complexity. The Harvard version builds on the original code base developed by Alex Simoes at the MIT Media Lab and uses a different method for cleaning the data than the OEC.

The Atlas of Economic Complexity (tool) The data visualizations in Harvard Growth Lab’s Atlas of Economic Complexity map global trade, industrial capabilities, and economic dynamics for the world. The Atlas follows the Bustos-Yildirim Method for data cleaning the raw data that is reported the United Nations Statistical Division (COMTRADE) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Direction of Trade Statistics Database. It includes data from 250 countries and territories, classified into 20 categories of goods and five categories of services. Combined, this results in coverage of over 6000 products worldwide, with coloured dots representing exports of $100 million.

The Observatory of Economic Complexity (platform) The OEC is a platform that creates visual narratives about countries and the products each country imports and exports. The data are from the following data sources, cleaned and made compatible:

1962–2000: The Center for International Data from Robert Feenstra 2001–2017: UN COMTRADE

References

External links The Observatory of Economic Complexity (2011) The Atlas of Economic Complexity (Online) (2013) Ricardo Hausmann, Cesar A. Hidalgo, et al., The Atlas of Economic Complexity, (2011) Puritan Press, Hollis New Hampshire. The Atlas of Economic Complexity The Atlas of Economic Complexity (Digital Edition)

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The Atlas of Economic Complexity

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The Atlas of Economic Complexity claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The Atlas of Economic Complexity before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The Atlas of Economic Complexity ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The Atlas of Economic Complexity

In research: The Atlas of Economic Complexity appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The Atlas of Economic Complexity in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The Atlas of Economic Complexity is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 2011 non-fiction books, Complexity economics, Economics books, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The Atlas of Economic Complexity outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The Atlas of Economic Complexity in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The Atlas of Economic Complexity means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The Atlas of Economic Complexity out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The Atlas of Economic Complexity in simple terms?

Why does The Atlas of Economic Complexity matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The Atlas of Economic Complexity?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The Atlas of Economic Complexity.