Higher military spending correlates with greater wood/paper imports
Comparing Primary wood and paper products (export/import) — Import value with Military expenditure (current USD), gaps filled across 141 countries, 2024–2024.
- Rank correlation
- +0.84
- Holding size constant
- +0.61
- Countries compared
- 141
- Period
- 2024–2024
What might link these
Wealthier or more industrialized nations may spend more on defense and import more wood/paper products for construction or manufacturing. A careful reader should note that correlation does not imply causation—other factors like trade policies or resource scarcity could drive both.
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. The correlation could be inflated by unmeasured confounders like industrialization or trade openness.
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.