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The United States has bounced around, but always in the top 10. The lowest it's ever been is number eight.
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It is now number 11. The United States is viewed as closing some of their borders.
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I think it's consistent with President Trump's policies. Welcome to the Ripple Effect, the podcast that
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takes you on a journey through the minds of Oregon faculty. I'm your host, Dan Loney, and in each
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episode, we'll be diving deep into the inspiration behind the groundbreaking research that Wharton professors have
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conducted and exploring how their findings resonate with the world today. The annual best countries report is out.
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It takes a look not only at the wealth that a country has, but also the policies that are in place and how they
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are having an impact not only on their population, but on other countries as well.
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Pleasure to welcome in Dave Rebstein, marketing professor here at the Wharton School.
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He is the lead on this report each and every year, and he joins us right now to discuss the 2026 report.
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Hi, Dave. How are you, sir? I'm doing just fine. Good to see you again, and thanks for
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having me on the program. Absolutely. Always great to chat with you. I guess let me start looking at larger
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scale. Having done this so many years, what do you think, or what is the importance of
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doing a report like this? I think one of the most important things for any product is their brand and how
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people think about that brand. I think the same is true for countries. The reason it's important for products is if
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people feel positively about it, they're more likely to buy it. They're more likely to pay more for it
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if they think positively about the brand. I think the same is true in a little bit different way for countries.
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If you feel more positively about a country, you're more likely to visit it. You're more likely to buy products from it.
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You're more likely to invest in it. We see foreign direct investment, foreign trade, and
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tourism all directly affected by it. Brands spend lots of time products on brands
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to try and attract people. Countries should be thinking the same way. Many countries have their own brand manager.
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It's because they're concerned about it. When you put these together, and having talked
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to you many years, I know there are quite a few components in play here. Just go over a couple of some of
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the ones you think are very important that go into ranking a country for this list.
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There are quite a few. For example, what it is that I'm measuring. By the way, I take a sample from
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around the world. Over 15,000 different respondents have answered to our survey this year.
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I say our survey. I'm doing this together with WPP, their brand asset value division, BAV.
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We sample all around the world, as I said. We ask people about 73 different attributes.
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There's so many that play a large role. Dimensions that play a role for people is
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perception about a country's social purpose. Perception about whether or not a country is
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dynamic and on the move. Being a mover. A good place to do business is a really important thing.
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It doesn't have a good entrepreneurial environment. Those are all things that business decision makers
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would care about, as well as overall citizens. I'm going to guess that artificial intelligence is
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starting to become a component within this report as well. Specifically, we asked about their attitudes towards artificial
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intelligence. We see a huge divergence across various countries. Overall, most of the world is very positive
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about AI. In fact, I can tell you 72% of the respondents in the survey believe that
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there are more benefits than threats from AI. We hear all this stuff in the news
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about, oh my gosh, the Anthropic CEO said slow down. The Anthropic CEO said slow down.
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I don't know if it's they're behind or whatever. It's like we hear all sorts of things
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about the threats of AI. 72% of the world believes that AI has more benefits than threats, but that differs
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by country. We will see some countries that say, whoa, we really need to be concerned.
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Probably on the low end of that scale is France. France is most concerned about AI and its
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impact. Surprisingly, it's a lot of the developing countries that are embracing an AI and saying this
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is going to be something really good. Maybe because that was something that caught me
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by surprise. It may be, and I don't know this, but it may be because they see this
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as a way for them to catch up or maybe even leapfrog some other countries. Right.
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It would be a very important component for their future growth to be able to have
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this and it'll keep them on a somewhat level playing field, correct? That's right.
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Switzerland is ranked number one in this report. If memory serves me, Switzerland has been at
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or near the top for several years now, correct? What is it about Switzerland that got them
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to number one but keeps them up near the top? It is amazing. Switzerland is up there almost every year, as
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you said. It hasn't been every year, but almost every year. It is the case that Switzerland is viewed
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as not bureaucratic, certainly not corrupt as one of the main things that they've got going
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for them. Boy, that is so important. A good place to do business, a very clean environment, one that cares about social purpose
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and impact on the overall environment. It's definitely one of the things. They are considered second in terms of open
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for business, only behind, and here's another big surprise, Luxembourg. Luxembourg, it seems like many people could not
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find Luxembourg on a map. By the way, I ran border to border with Luxembourg, and it's only because it's such
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a small country. It turns out Luxembourg has very low taxes, very easy to do business in there, but
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Switzerland is right up there number two in terms of ease of doing business and non
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-corrupt and what it is that they do. That puts them right up there. They're certainly known for financial services, for precision
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watchmaking. Those help contribute to it. It's also viewed as safe, great scenery, and
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very politically stable. Those are all things that help contribute to it. The United States is 11th in this year's
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report. I remember you and I have talked about this for many years. Seemingly every year, the US is somewhere in
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the top 10. What is it that has the US dropping from the top 10 this year? There probably are a bunch of things that
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have happened, but the biggest area in which the United States has fallen, and you're right,
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by the way, the United States has bounced around but always in the top 10. The lowest it's ever been is number eight.
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It is now number 11, and it's viewed as less open for business. We pride ourselves in our great economy, but
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being less open for business is certainly part of it. In some sense, probably the tariffs.
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Well, I was going to say, because that's something that President Trump has talked about a
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lot, about bringing business back to the United States and opening up our country for business.
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Is it something that it just hasn't transformed to the way that he wants, but obviously
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the tariffs being a big part of the problem here? No, it's an interesting aspect.
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The way I hear President Trump is he talks about bringing business back to the United
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States within the United States to serve the American citizens. This is a global survey, and how others,
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not just in the United States, but from throughout the world view about doing business in
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the United States, and to some degree, the United States is viewed as closing some of
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their borders in many ways to doing business with others. I think it's consistent with President Trump's policies.
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Is there something then within the component of the US rankings, whether it be the open
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for business component or something else, that we should be focusing on as a country right
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now to try and lift the United States back up higher on that ranking? Well, I guess it depends on what your
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objectives are. If your objective is to be high in the rankings and to attract external investment, yes,
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there's things that we could be doing to attract people. We've made it more difficult to get visas
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and do business here. We've set up these increased tariffs, and those make it less open to outsiders to doing
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trade. That's some of what it is that this is reflecting. It's open for business with the world.
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One of the things that I noticed, especially just looking at the top 15 countries or
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so, is that there seem to be several countries from the Nordic region and from the
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ASEAN region. Is there something within those regions that structurally has them high up on this set of
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rankings? I think certainly within the Nordic region, the Scandinavian countries, they are viewed as very socially
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conscious. Their governments are investing in that. Actually, some of the ASEAN countries, one of
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the countries we haven't talked about yet is China. China is viewed as concerned about the environment
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more than the United States is. Some of that, while we know about all the pollution that's in Beijing, for example, we
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also see all the solar panels that are there, all the electric vehicles that are now
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coming out of China and going to other parts of the world. Concerned about the environment is a really big
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thing. Open for business, China has been really on the rise and people see that they could
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do business easily in China, at least perceived to see it, that it's easy to do business in China and China's trying to attract
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foreign investment, whereas the United States, to a large degree, is saying, we're going to do
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it on our own. I think that's probably what the survey ends up showing. OK, so expand on that with China and
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give a more larger scale look as to not only those components you mentioned, but just
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what China is trying to do right now, because there obviously is a back and forth
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between the US and China at this moment. And there's a perception of concern of, you
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know, theft of intellectual property and some of these other areas that are concerning.
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But as you just laid out, especially with the EVs, the stories you hear about the
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EVs, the development of those products and wanting to go to other countries, it is looking
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to try and get into other markets as well. That's right. And setting up manufacturing facilities in other countries
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and Africa, you know, obviously, you know, China has invested a lot in Africa. They've been doing a lot of business with
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South America. And so they've been reaching out in many ways, trying to engage in commerce.
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A lot of it is just exporting of their goods. But it is trying to attract foreign companies
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to come there. And what I've seen over the 10 years now that I've been doing this survey is
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I've seen China continuing to inch up and get closer and closer. And they're up to number 14, which is
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a big move for China. Is there a country in this year's rankings that stands out as a good surprise, one
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that maybe, you know, found itself in a spot that you didn't expect them to be in?
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And what was it that got them to that point? I think to some degree, nothing so surprised
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because I keep seeing this motion picture as I've been measuring it year by year.
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Probably the biggest surprise may be the UAE. Not a surprise to us, but the UAE,
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you know, continues to grow in the world's opinion as a place now, how the current
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war now, these data, by the way, were collected before the current skirmish or war or
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whatever we want to call it in the Middle East. But a great place to go visit, a
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great place to travel through, a great place to do shopping, but also a great place
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for businesses. So, you know, half the respondents are business decision makers.
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And it turns out, you know, they have got all these tax-free zones and have made it, you know, come do business here
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and have made it something that's really attractive. So what I've seen is the UAE has
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really jumped up. They were number 18. They may make it to the top 10. So I'll finish up with this.
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Is there something that you have seen within the report, larger scale, kind of an overarching
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idea or theme that has developed this year or maybe in the last couple of years to really kind of, you know, push the
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steam in this report moving forward? I think investment concern about global issues is
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certainly one that we see from, you know, that help shape people's outside of a country,
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perceptions of a country. And so being concerned about the environment has really taken, as you said, the Nordic countries
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up very high. That's not a, you know, a Sweden-only issue. It's an issue for the world.
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And so I think the world sees it. And I think the world sees those countries that are concerned about the overall health of
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the world are valued more. Dave, always great to talk to you about this report. Thanks again for your time in putting it
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together. And thanks again for spending a few moments with us today. Well, again, thank you for having me.
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I'm good to see you again. Good to see you, too, as well. Dave Rabestein, marketing professor here at the Wharton
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School. Thank you for listening to The Ripple Effect. We hope you found this episode informative and
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engaging. Don't forget to subscribe and leave us a review so that we can continue to bring
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you the best insight from the Wharton School.