The next version of the Penn World Table, version 9.0, is currently under development with numerous changes. There is no firm release date at this point, other than 'as soon as possible'. Our best estimate at this point will be a release in the first quarter of 2016. Read on for the features of PWT9.0


This new release will have the following new or changed features:

1. Incorporate the relative price data from ICP 2011. This will extend country coverage from 167 to 179 and lead to notable revisions to real GDP series, especially for countries in Central America and the Caribbean, which did not participate in ICP 2005. We also incorporate newer data on relative prices of exports and imports.
2. New National Accounts data covering the period up to 2014. Revisions to National Accounts will also affect data for several African countries, such as Nigeria. The introduction of the new accounting rules of SNA 2008 and ESA 2010 by numerous countries will also affect National Accounts time series.
3. Data on investment by asset type are being thoroughly revised, incorporating more data from country National Accounts and revised estimates according to the methodology we introduced with PWT version 8 (see Appendix C). We will make this investment dataset publicly available, though with health warnings about the uncertainty of some estimates.
4. Information on the average years of schooling – the main input for our estimates of a human capital index – will no longer be solely based on the Barro-Lee dataset, but also use the Cohen-Soto-Leker dataset. For several countries, such as Germany, these alternative data seem more reliable and congruent with a broader set of information.
5. In computing relative TFP levels and TFP growth rates, version 8 did not use the available data on average hours worked per person engaged. Version 9 will now incorporate such data, especially to get more reliable estimates of productivity growth.