The World Bank last Thursday released a major report that says that more than $1 trillion is paid globally in bribes yearly. This comes to an average of $2.7 billion per day. The figure does not include embezzlement of public funds or theft of public assets. The study by the World Bank Institute (WBI) in Washington, United States, is an ongoing research, but it shows that the scale of bribery as an economic crime is alarming. This can be seen when the figure is compared with the estimated size of the world economy in 2001-02, for example, which stood at just over US$30 trillion.