Politics
What Did World Leaders Study at School?
What Did World Leaders Study at School?
When it comes to the extremely challenging job of running a nation, a university education can help in setting up a leader for success. The vast majority of heads of government have some sort of post-secondary education – 83%, in fact – but their areas of study vary greatly.
Some leaders, like Alain Berset of Switzerland, specifically studied political science or law in university. Other leaders, such as Paraguayan president, Horacio Cartes, took a more roundabout path to the top, having studied aviation mechanics in the United States.
The following maps, from SavingSpot, are an informative look at what national leaders around the world studied in school.
Note: Hover over the maps to learn about leaders and their educational background.
North America
Donald Trump: America’s president holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business.
Justin Trudeau: Canada’s prime minister holds two degrees: a Bachelor of Arts in Literature from McGill University, and a Bachelor of Education from the University of British Columbia.
Enrique Peña Nieto: Mexico’s president holds a law degree from Universidad Panamerica, and an MBA from the Monterrey Institute of Technology.
Europe
Angela Merkel: Germany’s chancellor has a heavy-hitting educational background. Merkel was educated at Karl Marx University, in Leipzig, where she studied physics from 1973 to 1978. She was awarded a doctorate for her thesis on quantum chemistry in 1986, and was recognized for her proficiency in Russian and mathematics.
Emmanuel Macron: The French president studied philosophy at the University of Paris-Ouest Nanterre La Défense. As well, Macron obtained a master’s degree in public affairs at the Paris Institute of Political Studies.
Stefan Löfven: Sweden’s prime minister took a more unconventional path to government. After completing military service in the Swedish Air Force, Löfven became a welder and subsequently a union representative. Eventually, Löfven became the first chairman of IF Metall, a newly formed trade union representing over 300,000 workers.
Asia
Vladimir Putin: Before joining the KGB in 1975, Putin studied Law at the Leningrad State University (now Saint Petersburg State University).
Xi Jinping: Xi studied chemical engineering at Beijing’s prestigious Tsinghua University. During this time, China was fully immersed in the Cultural Revolution. Xi studied as a “Worker-Peasant-Soldier student”, which included blocks of time spent doing farm work and studying Marxism–Leninism–Mao Zedong thought.
Africa
John Magufuli: Tanzania’s president has an extensive educational background, earning masters and doctorate degrees in chemistry from The University of Dar es Salaam.
Uhuru Kenyatta: The Kenyan president studied economics, political science, and government at Amherst College in Massachusetts.
South America
Michel Temer: Brazil’s president attended the Law School of the University of São Paulo, and later completed a doctorate in public law at the Pontifical Catholic University of São Paulo.
Mauricio Macri: Before becoming an analyst at SIDECO Americana, Argentina’s president received a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the Pontifical Catholic University of Argentina. He also attended Columbia Business School, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and the Universidad del CEMA in Buenos Aires.
Oceania
Malcolm Turnbull: Australia’s prime minister graduated from the University of Sydney with a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Laws, before earning a Bachelor of Civil Law at Brasenose College, Oxford.
Enele Sopoaga: The prime minister of the tiny island nation of Tuvalu is one of many world leaders educated in the United Kingdom. Sopoaga earned a Certificate in Diplomatic Studies from Oxford University, and a master’s degree from the University of Sussex.
War
Visualized: Top 15 Global Tank Fleets
Heavily armed and armored, the modern tank is a versatile and mobile weapons platform, and a critical piece of contemporary warfare.Â
The Top 15 Global Tank Fleets
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Heavily armed and armored, the modern tank is a versatile and mobile weapons platform, and a critical piece of contemporary warfare.
This visualization shows the top 15 global tank fleets, using data from the 2024 Military Balance report from the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS).
Let’s take an in-depth look at the top three fleets:
1. United States
As the world’s pre-eminent military power, it’s perhaps no surprise that the United States also has the largest tank fleet, by a wide margin.
In total, they have just over 45,000 armored fighting vehicles in operation, along with 2,640 main battle tanks (MBTs), and 12,800 vehicles in storage, of which 2,000 are main battle tanks.
Category | Vehicles | Global rank |
---|---|---|
Main battle tanks | 2,640 | 4 |
Armored reconnaissance | 1,745 | 1 |
Infantry fighting vehicles | 3,262 | 3 |
Armored personnel carriers | 10,644 | 1 |
Amphibious assault vehicles | 1,401 | 1 |
Armored utility vehicles | 28,445 | 1 |
Storage | 12,800 | 1 |
Total | 60,937 | 1 |
The U.S. is internalizing the lessons from the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, where Western-supplied anti-tank weapons and massed Ukrainian artillery have been cutting Russian tanks to pieces. As a result, the U.S. recently canceled an upgrade of the M1 Abrams in favor of a more ambitious upgrade.
Meanwhile, the U.S. is nervously eyeing a more confident China and a potential clash over Taiwan, where air and naval forces will be critical. However, a recent war game showed that Taiwanese mechanized ground forces, kitted out with American-made tanks and armored fighting vehicles, were critical in keeping the island autonomous.
2. Russia
According to Oryx, a Dutch open-source intelligence defense website, at time of writing, Russia has lost almost 2,800 main battle tanks since invading Ukraine. Considering that in the 2022 edition of the Military Balance, Russia was estimated to have 2,927 MBTs in operation, those are some hefty losses.
Russia has been able to maintain about 2,000 MBTs in the field, in part, by increasing domestic production. Many defense plants have been taken over by state-owned Rostec and now operate around the clock. Russia is also now spending a full third of their budget on defense, equivalent to about 7.5% of GDP.
At the same time, they’ve also been drawing down their Soviet-era stockpiles, which are modernized before being sent to the front. Just how long they can keep this up is an open question; their stockpiles are large, but not limitless. Here is what their storage levels look like:
Category | 2023 | 2024 | YOY change |
---|---|---|---|
Main battle tanks | 5,000 | 4,000 | -20.0% |
Armored reconnaissance | 1,000 | 100 | -90.0% |
Infantry fighting vehicles | 4,000 | 2,800 | -30.0% |
Armored personnel carriers | 6,000 | 2,300 | -61.7% |
Total | 16,000 | 9,200 | -42.5% |
3. China
China holds the third overall spot and top place globally for the number of main battle tanks in operation. Untypically, the People’s Liberation Army has no armored vehicles in storage, which perhaps isn’t surprising when you consider that China has been rapidly modernizing its military and that stockpiles usually contain older models.
China also has one of the world’s largest fleets of armored fighting vehicles, second only to the United States. Breaking down that headline number, we can also see that they have the largest number of light tanks, wheeled guns, and infantry fighting vehicles.Â
Category | Vehicles | Global rank |
---|---|---|
Main battle tanks | 4,700 | 1 |
Light tanks | 1,330 | 1 |
Wheeled guns | 1,250 | 1 |
Infantry fighting vehicles | 8,200 | 1 |
Armored personnel carriers | 3,604 | 5 |
Airborne combat vehicles | 180 | 2 |
Amphibious assault vehicles | 990 | 2 |
Total | 20,254 | 3 |
This is equipment that would be integral if China were to make an attempt to reunify Taiwan with the mainland by force, where lightly armored mechanized units need to move with speed to occupy the island before Western allies can enter the fray. It’s worth noting that China also has one of the world’s largest fleets of amphibious assault vehicles.
End of the Tank?
Many commentators at the outset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, were quick to predict the end of the tank, however, to paraphrase Mark Twain, reports of the tank’s demise are greatly exaggerated.
With the U.S. and China both developing remote and autonomous armored vehicles, tanks could be quite different in the future, but there is nothing else that matches them for firepower, mobility, and survivability on the modern battlefield today.
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