Three defining trends for the global economy

We see three major defining trends for the global economy: The weakening of global trade, which means that different regions’ economic cycles are no longer correlated and that growth can only result from vigorous domestic demand; The world’s transformation into a service economy, which is one of the explanations for the weakness of global trade. It leads to low investment needs, which contributes to the fall in real interest rates, and penalises countries specialised in industry; Low real interest rates and the rise in the participation rate (the proportion of the working-age population that is in the labour market), which explain why both supply and demand for goods and services can continue to grow despite a low unemployment rate.