India to Overtake China as Second-Largest Economy by 2060, Global GDP Report Suggests

Global Economic Shift: India to Surpass China in Global GDP by 2060

A recent report by researchers associated with the World Inequality Lab (WIL) has made a significant prediction about the future of global economic power. According to the report, titled Global Justice Report: A Plan for Equality and Prosperity With Planetary Boundaries, India is expected to surpass China in terms of its share of global GDP measured in purchasing power parity (PPP) by 2060.

The World Inequality Lab, a research laboratory based at the Paris School of Economics (PSE), has been studying inequality worldwide. The report highlights that China's share in world GDP is currently about 20% in PPP terms, which is about one third higher than the US. By 2035, China's share is projected to be twice as large as the US, according to benchmark projections.

However, China's population share is declining rapidly. From 23% of the world population in 1945 to about 17% in 2025 and less than 8% in 2100, China's population is falling fast. As a consequence, the share of China in world GDP is projected to stabilize and decline in the second half of the 21st century, and to be overtaken by India around 2060.

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The report notes that China is unlikely to ever reach the kind of hegemonic position that the US had in the world around 1950 (with as much as 35-40% of the world's GDP) or which Europe had around 1900-1910 (around 40-45%). Instead, the world is set to be multipolar in the 21st century, unlike the worlds of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Interestingly, the report points out that India has much more inequality than China, but much lower productivity growth. This can be explained by larger and better-targeted human capital expenditure in China.

Purchasing power parities (PPPs) measure the total amount of goods and services that a single unit of a country's currency can buy in another country. According to the latest World Economic Outlook (WEO), in 2026, India's gross domestic product (GDP) is expected to be around $4.15 trillion, up from $3.92 trillion in 2025. The UK's GDP is projected to hit $4.27 trillion, while Japan's GDP would actually fall from $4.48 trillion in 2025 to $4.38 trillion in 2026.

The US GDP in 2026 is expected to be $32.38 trillion, while China, the second-largest economy, is pegged at $20.85 trillion.

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