Emerging nations expect better economic conditions ahead

Seven years after the beginning of the global financial crisis, a new Pew Research Center survey of 40 nations finds that people in fewer than half of those countries have a positive view of their nation's economy.

But there are signs of growing public faith in economic recoveries in some of the world's largest economies.

In the nations surveyed, a median of 45 per cent say current economic conditions in their country are good. And just 39 per cent believe that their economy will improve over the next year, a pessimism that echoes projections by the International Monetary Fund. The IMF expects global growth in 2015 will be marginally slower than that in 2014. Only in developing nations does a majority (58 per cent) expect conditions to get better.

The predominant view among people in emerging and developing countries is that their national economies will improve over the next 12 months. But a majority in advanced economies expects economic conditions to remain about the same.