100th Anniversary of the Turkish Economy: An Assessment of Macroeconomic Performance

The aim of this study is to present the outlook of the Turkish economy in the centennial year by utilizing descriptive statistics and the calculated macroeconomic performance index. In this respect, Türkiye's economic growth, inflation, unemployment, current account balance, and budget balance data for the last two decades (2003-2022) are analyzed. The Turkish economy in 2023 is evaluated with the macroeconomic performance index calculated with these data. According to the study, Türkiye is not in a bad position in the current account deficit and unemployment variables compared to the past two decades, while it performs poorly in economic growth, budget deficit, and especially inflation variables. As a matter of fact, the calculated macroeconomic performance index shows that the last five years of the Turkish economy have been the worst five-year period in the last two decades. Likewise, in 2023, the macroeconomic performance index is projected to be well below the average of the last two decades and to take the lowest value after 2022. The study compares Türkiye's macroeconomic performance with other countries from around the world and finds that Türkiye's macroeconomic performance is also poor compared to these countries. In a comparison of 8 developing countries excluding Türkiye, Türkiye outperformed only two countries. According to both the internal and comparative evaluation of Türkiye, it is concluded that Türkiye has a negative economic outlook in its 100th year and that this outlook will continue for at least the next few years.