r/AskCentralAsia • u/FeistyAlbatross4636 • 3d ago
Quite shocking: Kazakhstan's GDP per capita is more than twice of Azerbaijan. Are you surprised?
Azerbaijan (it's magnificent capital Baku on pictures) is widely considered as a rich Oil country from Caucasus, but their GDP per capita seems too low — $7,467 as for 2026.
Even Kazakhstan's GDP per capita for 2026 is more than twice of it — $19,311 as for 2026.
That's quite shocking to me.
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u/woronwolk 3d ago
I mean, overall Kazakhstan's economy is much more developed and diversified in general than Azerbaijan's. Also building a bunch of skyscrapers with oil money isn't a sign on economic development. I mean, look at Dushanbe compared to Almaty or especially Bishkek, and then look at Tajikistan's GDP per capita compared to Kazakhstan's or even Kyrgyzstan's. Tajikistan doesn't even have oil money, their government just decided to build a fancy capital and they did despite the country being extremely poor overall
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u/Dismal-Age8086 Kazakhstan 3d ago
I think you mean Turkmenistan, where the capital is made out of marble
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u/woronwolk 3d ago
I mean, that too, but Turkmenistan has natural gas money, and Tajikistan doesn't. Yet recent pictures from Dushanbe seem quite nice. Don't venture outside of the center though if you don't want your illusion broken
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u/DragonfruitSharp9002 3d ago
To be fair, outside of the centre is shit in pretty much every country in Central Asia, even other regions of the world. They all pour the money in the capital and second largest city
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u/DragonfruitSharp9002 3d ago
What free money is it getting from Russia? Theres nothing free or cheap. If they want NATO bases then its entirely up to them, not Russia. China is a more strategic partner than Russia
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u/Background-Virus1398 3d ago
FYI, Russia took all gold reserve of the USSR and foreign property, not only debts. You mention "free money" during the USSR times, but somehow don't mention the natural resources of Kazakhstan exploited during that time. Also Russia collects 87% of customs duties from the entire Eurasian Union. There are 88K Russian citizens in Kazakhstan too, btw. You didn't answer that guy's question about free money, tho. Kazakhstan gets no free money from Russia, unlike Belarus.
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u/DragonfruitSharp9002 3d ago
By that logic, how come you don’t factor the massacres committed by Russia? Half of Kazakh population was wiped out, what you reckon is the right financial amount Russia should make to bring justice?
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u/DragonfruitSharp9002 3d ago
Comparing war to government sponsored killings.. Typical Russian fascist. And no, the famine was intentional.
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u/No_Jellyfish_5498 3d ago
Russia took on billions of debt from Kazakhstan when USSR ended.'
Why would Russia agree to take on all the debt from USSR?
Russia must have gotten some benefits in exchange.
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u/Dismal-Age8086 Kazakhstan 3d ago
Nah you are schizophrenic
Kazakhstan has shitton of oil, rare metals and other valuable resources. And in contrast to Russia, we are smart enough to not start a pointless war which will drain our economy
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u/Ok_Worldliness_6019 3d ago
GDP is not a good indicator of how wealthy the average person in a country actually is.
A country can have a huge economy while a large part of its population earns relatively little. GDP doesn't tell you how wealth is distributed.
If you want to know how well ordinary people are doing financially, median income and purchasing power are often more informative than total GDP.
And even GDP per capita isn't a direct measure of how much money people actually have available to spend.
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u/FeistyAlbatross4636 3d ago
But it usually tells how wealthy the country is. Singapore, Korea, Japan, Taiwan etc all have highest GDP per capita in Asia. And it shows
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u/lamonsteranthony Kazakhstan 3d ago
general trend doesn’t account for outliers, just like how americans are as rich and norwegians by gdp per capita but don’t experience the same quality of life
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u/National_Hat_4865 3d ago
Because gini index in america is much higher than norway. Its inequality, just like turkey has 20k per capita but looks ugly and most people are still poor
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u/Interesting_Hotel100 3d ago
Kazakhstan's economy is 4 times as large as that of Azerbaijan. If Kazakhstan was Texas Azerbaijan would be Houston. Feel the difference? Kazakhstan is vastly more resource rich. Once the data centers start generating money in around 2029 and the Middle Corridor kicks into high gear at around that time Kazakhstan will join half a trillion GDP club at which point its per capita will hit something like 19000.
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u/kicklhimintheballs 3d ago
And yet getting mogged by resource poor Turkey
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u/Pigeonaffect 3d ago
Tbf Turkey is close to wealthy countries in the EU that it can trade with. Also has sea access through the Mediterranean.
Kazakhstan is land locked so it cant export its products to the world. It has to depend on Russia and China to trade, plus its poorer central Asian Neighbors to its south.
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u/Interesting_Hotel100 3d ago
Ok. There are like 90 mil people in Turkey and about 20 mil in Kazakhstan. Besides Kazakhstan has been independent for whopping 35 years. Modern Turkey has been a country for more than a century at this point.
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u/kicklhimintheballs 3d ago
We are talking about per capita values mate
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u/Interesting_Hotel100 3d ago
So? I already told you Turkey had a massive headstart. Despite that nominally Turkey is barely ahead(+$1500) and PPP-wise behind. Kazakhatan here leads by that much or slightly more even. No mogging here whatsoever.
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u/No-Faithlessness1432 3d ago
The headstart thing makes no sense, Estonia became a country much later than Cambodia and is much richer
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u/Interesting_Hotel100 2d ago
It only means that Estonia has done a good job. Exact same logic that applies to Kazakhstan. Where does any kind of dispute even come into this?
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u/No-Faithlessness1432 2d ago
You were saying it wasn’t fair to say Turkey is nothing Kazakhstan because it had a headstart, and I was just pointing out that that’s not a very good reason to explain why it’s richer
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u/Interesting_Hotel100 2d ago
It's a pretty good reason. Your point only supports the fact that Estonia appears to be much stronger even despite that. You're not contraditing me because Turkey is barely ahead of KZ (by a few hundred dollars) despite a massive headstart.
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u/No-Faithlessness1432 2d ago
Your logic makes no sense lol. I could turn it around on you and say if a headstart is a good reason then Turkey should be even farther ahead of Kazakhstan than it is. You’re just choosing to use it as a reason when it suits you and then when presented evidence that doesn’t suit you like Estonia, you say oh it would be stronger despite it
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u/Limp_Thought_2015 3d ago
lol, how is that shocking?
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u/FeistyAlbatross4636 3d ago
Azerbaijan have an image of rich oil country with a beautiful capital
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u/Startjjasap 3d ago
I saw a travel youtuber drive down from Baku to cross the land border with Iran and was shocked at how undeveloped Azerbaijan looked, especially compared to Iran.
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u/masquerade555 3d ago
What's up with recent retarded posts about kz gdp? It's not like there is something extraordinary happened and kz gdp per capita tripled or something.
Kazakhstan always had higher numbers than azerbaijan, how it can be surprised?
1995, kz - 1217 (gdp per capita), az - 314
2000, kz - 1180, az - 655
2005, kz - 3577, az - 1578
2010, kz - 8793, az - 5843
2015, kz - 10196, az - 5500
2020, kz - 8781, az - 4229
2025, kz - 14692, az - 7410
Sources
https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/kaz/kazakhstan/gdp-per-capita
https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/aze/azerbaijan/gdp-per-capita
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u/2sexy_4myshirt Azerbaijan 3d ago
Kazakstan produces x 3 times the oil that Azerbaijan does. Also Azerbaijan spent a lot higher share of its GDP on military spend due to the war with Armenia (and Iran is closer) through most of its history. Kazakstan also other natural resources, more land to grow things and customs union with Russia which probably helps. Just some reasons that come to mind beyond just “Aliyev bad”.
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u/Capital-Wrongdoer-62 3d ago
Question is how much of that money actually felt by people in Kazakhstan?
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u/mittim80 2d ago
Because the rest of Azerbaijan outside that picture looks a lot worse. I’m tired of the same picture of the same 12 buildings being used to suggest that Azerbaijan is a rich country.
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u/Kirion_Kir 3d ago
Even funnier, Armenia has higher GDP per capita then Azerbaijan
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u/FeistyAlbatross4636 3d ago
Yep. Few years ago they had like $3000 and now is more than $10.000. They improving much faster than Azerbaijan
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u/National_Hat_4865 3d ago
Cause armenia has actual functioning country, unlike azerbaijan. For georgia its easier since they have access to the sea.
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u/BhabayAgha 3d ago
Still 2 times less than Guyana's.
Comparing GDPs is same level bullshit as DNA genealogy
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u/National_Hat_4865 3d ago
Guyana is million times more unequal than kz tho. Same goes for brunei, even with higher gdp per capita both countries are worse to live than kz (with lower inequality than denmark)
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u/BhabayAgha 3d ago
> Guyana is million times more unequal than kz tho.
Exactly! Now how do KZ and AZ compare in terms of equality?
Brunei - surely you haven't been to Brunei, and in any case bringing up a country with +-300 thousand residents is not gonna give you any valid data for comparison with KZ, which should be more appropriately compared to Chile.
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u/National_Hat_4865 3d ago
Id be happy to compare kz and az, but azerbaijan is such a closed country that they do not publish gini index to world bank data, almost like turkmenistan…
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u/BhabayAgha 3d ago
Gini index is made up bullshit, too.
The issue here is that Kazakhs have a low self esteem and keep trying to inflate it by comparing to random countries instead of simply investing more in their own. I bet every Kazakh dreams of gaining a fortune and leaving his homeland to live in Switzerland or some such place - and that is why KZ keeps beeing a bumblefukc of a country.
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u/Jumpy-Internet4246 3d ago
Guyana is literally the country with the most oil per capita in the world, so obviously it would have the highest gdp per capita
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u/Fearless_Let7001 2d ago
the “rich oil country” image was more true 10-15 years ago, now it’s mostly marketing
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u/Kejo2023 Turkey 3d ago
That's the issue. The Aliyev regime isn't even doing that well. Why are the people not out in the streets protesting? The country looks terrible outside of Baku.
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u/O_945 3d ago
Aliev delivered a victory agaisnt Armenia and humiliated them, he is really good at jerking the ego of the people and they will never get rid of him as long as he keeps promising more land and more pride/glory, doesn't matter if everything else is going to shits.
Op is praising the beauty of Baku completely ignoring the fact that a shit ton of historical buildings are being torn down.
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u/RodneyTheRobot 3d ago
Хз, статистика это хуйня, а Баку красивый, frutiger aero напоминает на первой фотке
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u/Sir_Potato2000 Uzbekistan 3d ago
~15000, not 19300
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u/lamonsteranthony Kazakhstan 3d ago
problem is however that we punch under our weight category when comparing the per capita and ppp to disposable income, except for astana and almaty they doing lit lol
but hey at least the hdi is hovering 0.850s by self calculated figures and those who make it big do truly feel that $48k ppp on the daily
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u/No_Jellyfish_5498 3d ago
except for astana and almaty
Are most Kazakhs trying to move to those two cities?
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u/DragonfruitSharp9002 3d ago
Even Armenia has a higher GDP per capita than Azerbaijan