Fewer young girls linked to more gold reserves
Comparing Total reserves (gold at market value) (SDR), per capita with Population ages 00-04, female, per capita across 171 countries, 2025–2025.
- Rank correlation
- -0.77
- Holding size constant
- -0.68
- Countries compared
- 171
- Period
- 2025–2025
What might link these
The relationship between fewer young females and higher gold reserves per capita might be influenced by a country's economic development stage, as both indicators could be linked to a nation's wealth and demographic transition. A careful reader should consider education and family planning policies as potential underlying factors. Urbanization could be a likely confounder.
Why this is not proof of anything
This is a correlation across countries, not an experiment. It cannot show that either indicator causes the other, and both may simply follow a third thing. This correlation might mislead by implying a direct link between demographics and gold reserves, when in fact both could be driven by broader economic and societal changes.
The second figure above repeats the measurement with national population and income held constant. It is the more conservative number: a relationship that largely disappears there was mostly telling you that larger, richer countries have more of most things.
How this was measured
Both indicators were ranked across every country reporting each, and the two rankings compared — ranks rather than raw values, because a handful of very large countries can otherwise manufacture a relationship on their own. The calculation is arithmetic over figures already published on this site; the commentary above is drafted from the two indicator names and the resulting coefficients.