Dr. Karen Abrams, founder and Executive Director of STEMGuyana and a holder of a doctorate in Educational Administration, is calling for a deliberate national strategy to expand Guyana’s middle class, arguing that the country’s unprecedented oil wealth will not produce lasting prosperity unless more citizens have the income to participate meaningfully in the economy.
Guyana currently produces about 900,000 barrels of oil per day, with ExxonMobil projecting output to reach approximately 1.7 million barrels per day by 2030. Based on the country’s estimated 11 billion barrels of recoverable oil resources, production could be sustained for roughly two to three decades, depending on output levels. At a production rate of about 1.5 million barrels per day, the reserves would last around 20 years, while lower production rates could extend the lifespan to 30 years or more. Further discoveries would lengthen that timeline.
At current oil prices, Guyana’s recoverable resources are valued at hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars, making the country one of the world’s fastest-growing oil producers and positioning it for decades of significant petroleum revenues.
In her Kaieteur News column published on May 25, 2026, Abrams warned that despite Guyana’s rapid economic growth, the country lacks the broad consumer base necessary to sustain a vibrant non-oil economy.
Using Georgetown’s restaurant sector as an illustration, Abrams observed that many businesses experience an initial surge of interest but struggle to remain viable over the long term.
“Watch the restaurant scene in Georgetown long enough, and a pattern emerges. A new eatery opens. There is a flurry of excitement. And then, within months, the indicators of struggling business appears and in many cases, a closed sign shortly thereafter,” she wrote.
According to Abrams, the problem is not a lack of entrepreneurship but a limited pool of consumers with disposable income.
“The same small group of faces tends to flock to every new opening. In a country where international agencies describe a 48% to 58% poverty rate, the broader population simply does not yet have the disposable income to support a wide, varied and rapidly expanding consumer economy.”
The observation comes against the backdrop of findings by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), which reported in 2025 that 58% of Guyana’s population lives in poverty and 32% in extreme poverty. Some local analysts, however, contend that the figures may be even higher, citing weaknesses in data collection methods and a reluctance among many citizens to speak openly about their economic circumstances.
She argued that these realities point to a deeper structural challenge facing Guyana as it seeks to balance the opportunities created by its oil boom with the need to ensure that economic growth translates into broad-based prosperity.
While Guyana has emerged as one of the world’s fastest-growing economies since the start of oil production in 2019, Abrams noted that much of the country’s wealth remains concentrated in the petroleum sector. Citing data from Harvard University’s Atlas of Economic Complexity, she said crude oil now accounts for approximately 91 percent of Guyana’s exports by value, while oil contributes more than half of the country’s Gross Domestic Product.
“The country sits atop one of the largest new oil discoveries of the century,” Abrams wrote, but noted that on measures of household purchasing power, Guyana continues to trail many of its Caribbean neighbours.
Referencing International Labour Organisation statistics published in 2024, Abrams said Guyana’s minimum wage, measured in purchasing power parity terms, ranks among the lowest in the CARICOM region.
“The opportunity to use this moment to reset that picture is exceptional, and the available fiscal headroom to do so has rarely been larger,” she wrote. “In other words, the nation is wealthy enough to get this done.”
Abrams maintained that expanding the middle class should be viewed not merely as a social policy objective but as an economic necessity. She argued that a larger middle-income population would create demand for local goods and services, strengthen small businesses, encourage entrepreneurship and reduce the economy’s dependence on oil revenues.
“A large middle class, however, is not a luxury,” she wrote. “It is the shock absorber of democratic life and the engine of consumer-led economic stability.”
The STEMGuyana founder pointed to public-sector wages as one of the most direct mechanisms for achieving that goal. She cited calls by the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU) for a minimum monthly public-sector salary of GY$221,000 and reports that a significant proportion of public servants earn considerably less after statutory deductions.
“Our teachers, nurses, police, soldiers, and civil servants are the foundation of the public goods on which all of us depend,” Abrams wrote. “There is a strong economic case, in addition to the ethical case, for ensuring that this group is supported through a sustained period of real wage growth.”
She argued that rising oil revenues and higher global oil prices have provided the government with the fiscal space to pursue transformative policies. Among the measures she proposed are significant public-sector wage increases, expanded tax-free income thresholds, reductions in Value Added Tax (VAT), procurement preferences for small Guyanese-owned businesses and targeted wage supports for low-income workers.
Abrams also advocated for earned income tax credits, similar to programmes used in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and New Zealand, to boost take-home pay and reduce working poverty.
She said the stakes extend far beyond individual businesses.
“Restaurants stay open because customers can afford to eat in them. Small businesses survive their first three years because demand exists across a wider population. New firms launch because the local market can absorb their products before they need to export,” she wrote.
Describing the current moment as one of the most important in Guyana’s modern history, Abrams said the country has the resources, talent and international attention needed to ensure oil wealth translates into broad-based prosperity.
“The Guyanese people have been promised prosperity,” she wrote. “We deserve a deliberate national plan to deliver it.”
