In order to accurately understand the essence of the world economy, you need to know what the structure of the world economy is. It is a complex dynamic mechanism consisting of numerous macroeconomic elements.
The structure of the world economy includes sectoral and intersectoral components, associations, enterprises, regions and complexes. They create the most important proportions in the production and consumption of GDP. The relations between these components make up the economic structure of the world economy. Stable development of the world economy is impossible without an optimally developed economic structure.
On the whole, the structure of the world economy, as well as its national variety, is a broad and diverse concept. It includes the following substructures: sectoral, territorial, reproductive, functional, and socio-economic.
The territorial structure shows how economic activity is distributed between countries and different territories.
The reproduction structure consists of such parts as accumulation, consumption, and export. It is a reflection of the state of the national economy, since the bias towards one of the components indicates the wrong state of things in the country's economy. For example, if 100% of industrial GDP goes only to consumption, this indicates an unstable economic situation in the country. The optimal ratio of consumption / accumulation / export will be 70% / 25% / 5%. Such proportions contribute to the development of export-import relations and minimize social tension.
The functional structure reflects the ratio of military and peaceful production, which is very important for the socio-economic situation of the country. Based on world experience, it can be argued that the higher the share of military production, the worse the economic situation in the country. Today, the costs of military production hinder the development of many countries. The optimal figure for defense spending is 1-2% of GDP. Anything above 6% leads to the degradation of peaceful production and a recession in the economy.
The socio-economic structure characterizes the relationship between the types of socio-economic structure. The type of structure depends on the type of property, several of them are distinguished: the family-communal (without private property), feudal (there is feudal property), small-scale (small business) and capitalist (which is characterized by large-scale industry, private capital and monopolies).
The sectoral structure of the world economy consists of a set of economic units that were formed in the process of division of labor and differ in production conditions. Macroeconomic analysis distinguishes the following main groups: industrial, agro-industrial (or agricultural), construction, production and non-production (services). In turn, these industries can be subdivided into subspecies. For example, industry is divided into mining and manufacturing.
To date, the world economy and its structure is characterized by a predominance of the share of the services sector. In the USA and Great Britain it reached 80%, in Japan and Canada - 70%, in Germany, Italy and France - about 60%. At the same time, the share of agriculture is declining, and industry is no more than 25-30% of GDP. Such trends are explained by the rapid development of scientific and technological progress, which gave rise to the formation of new industries and services.
Former Soviet countries are located at approximately the same level of development. The economy of such states is characterized by a high share of agriculture and industry and, accordingly, a low level of services.
In developing countries, the share of agriculture exceeds the share of industry. Their ratio is approximately 20-35% and 10-25%, respectively.