Inflation, Military Spending, and Zimbabwe Inflation

Hi All,
These couple of posts will be quick, as I've got Open House tonight with some of your parents.

Inflation rates, as you can find out in your book, can be a serious problem.  It is measured through increases in consumer prices.  The back cover of the Economist gives weekly figures for GDP growth, industrial production, Inflation (Consumer Prices), and Unemployment on a country-by-country basis.  Here are some figures for you to chew on:
Country - 2011 inflation rate (estimated by the Economist or the Economist Intelligence Unit)
United States - 2.9%
Japan - 0.3%
China - 5.3%
Britain - 4.4
Canada - 2.8
Euro Zone - 2.7
France - 2.2
Germany - 2.5
Greece - 3.2
Spain - 3.0
Russia - 8.9
Turkey - 6.0
Hong Kong - 5.0
Pakistan - 11.6
Singapore - 4.6
South Korea - 4.1
Taiwan - 1.9
Thailand - 4.3
Argentina - 9.8
Brazil - 6.6
Mexico - 3.5
Venezuela - 26.9
Egypt - 13.3
Israel - 3.8
Saudi Arabia - 5.6
South Africa - 5.2

Here is a link to a piece on Zimbabwe Inflation from a couple of years ago.  Their hyper-inflation rate at one point was 89.7 sextillion percent (or 8.97x10^22 percent).  It was the worst bout of hyper-inflation in recorded history.

Question 19 for tomorrow asks you to find the military spending for Brazil, Russia, North Korea, and Japan.  Here are their totals for % of GDP for that problem.  Note that GDP is for the official exchange rate, and is not adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP).
Global Security has a much better table - see: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/spending.htm

Brazil - 1.7% of GDP (GDP = $2.01 Trillion)
Japan - 0.8% of GDP (GDP = $5.459 Trillion)
North Korea - 25% of GDP (GDP = $40 Billion)
Russia - 3.9% of GDP (GDP = $2.116 Trillion)
United States - 5.2% of GDP (GDP = $14.120 Trillion)

The Stockholm International Peace Institute also has up-to-date data on all of this as well.  See:
http://milexdata.sipri.org/