Global Macro Database

The Global Macro Database (GMD), published as an NBER working paper by Müller, Xu, Lehbib, and Chen (2025), is a landmark effort to solve the single biggest bottleneck in cross-country economic research: macroeconomic data is scattered across hundreds of sources with inconsistent definitions, units, and coverage. GMD harmonises 46 variables (GDP, inflation, government finance, trade, unemployment, and more) from 160 sources — both historical archives and current databases — into a single, clean, panel dataset covering 239 countries from 1086 to the present, with forecasts to 2030. For India researchers, GMD provides a one-click starting point for any cross-country comparison involving Indian macro data, with Stata, R, and Python packages available. Free for academic and non-profit use; commercial use requires a licence. Updated quarterly. Trusted by 8,000+ researchers and policymakers.