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The World Bank is upgrading the outlook for global growth this year, predicting that COVID-19 vaccinations and massive government stimulus in rich countries will power the fastest worldwide expansion in nearly five decades.

In its latest Global Economic Prospects report, out Tuesday, the 189-country anti-poverty agency forecasts that the world economy will grow 5.6 percent this year, up from the 4.1 percent it forecast in January. The global economy last year shrank 3.5 percent as the coronavirus pandemic disrupted trade and forced businesses to close and people to stay home.

The projected expansion would make 2021 the fastest year of growth since 1973’s 6.6 percent.

But the 2021 rebound will be uneven, the bank predicts, led by rich countries such as the United States that could afford to spend vast amounts of taxpayer money to support their economies: 90 percent of advanced economies are expected to return to pre-pandemic levels next year — measured by income per person — versus just a third of developing countries.

Increased COVID vaccination has reinvigorated the world economy.Getty Images

The World Bank is calling for wider distribution of COVID vaccines to low-income countries, where inoculations have gone slowly.

The bank expects the US economy to expand 6.8 percent in 2021, up from the 3.5% it forecast in January; the world’s biggest economy shrank 3.5 percent last year as COVID-19 brought economic activity to a near standstill in the spring. But an aggressive vaccine rollout, along with low interest rates and massive government spending revived the economy.

China’s economy is is forecast to grow 8.5 percent in 2021.SOPA Images/LightRocket via Gett

China — the world’s No. 2 economy and the first to emerge from the coronavirus recession — is forecast to grow 8.5 percent in 2021 after expanding just 2.3 percent last year.

The 19 European countries that share the euro currency are collectively expected to 4.2 percent, reversing last year’s 6.6 percent drop. And Japan is forecast to post 2.9 percent growth this year after registering a 4.7 percent drop in economic output last year.

The bank notes downside risks to its forecast, including the possibility that the pandemic lingers, that inflation flares and forces central banks to raise interest rates and that countries struggle with high debt burdens.

Digital privacy experts are raising red flags about Walmart’s plans to give 740,000 employees free smartphones that the company says will improve worker productivity without collecting personal data.

Walmart said Thursday that it planned to give nearly half its US employees free Samsung Galaxy phones by the end of the year. Employees will use the phones to access the “Me@Walmart” app, which will allow them to clock in, manage shifts and communicate with supervisors.

Employees will also be allowed to take the phones home for personal use.

But Darrell West, a senior fellow at the Center of Technology Innovation at the Brookings Institution, had some blunt advice for Walmart workers: “Turn down the phone.”

“Employees should realize when they’re using company provided phones, the company can engage in surveillance on what they do on that phone,” West told The Post. “That can include a wide range of personal, financial and social interactions. Basically everything you do on that phone can be subject to surveillance.”

According to privacy disclosures on the Apple App Store, the “Me@Walmart” app can access employee data including financial information, precise location data and health and fitness information.

Walmart promises that this information is only used for app functions. Financial information is used for paychecks, precise location data confirms when employees clock in to work and health and fitness is used for coronavirus assessments, according to Walmart spokesperson Camille Dunn. She said that use of any individual feature was optional.

Walmart promises that the information it collects is only used for app functions like scheduling shifts. Wamart

“Walmart will not have access to any personal data,” Dunn told The Post.

She added that Walmart will not see employees’ non-work-related emails, text messages, calls, voicemails, browser history, photos, videos or location.

But West argued that the lines between work and personal information are less clear than presented by Walmart. He questioned whether employees’ personal email use and web browsing while on the clock could be monitored, for example.

On a Reddit forum used by Walmart workers, some users complained about the plan.

“Walmart will not have any access to personal data… HAHAHAHAHA,” wrote one apparent employee.

Another said, “Nah, we good. Keep it.”

United for Respect, a labor advocacy group, painted the smartphone initiative as a distraction from low wages at Walmart.

“Associates don’t need free smartphones, they need a starting wage of $15 and a voice in health and safety on the job,” the group’s corporate accountability director Bianca Agustin told The Post.

Another apparent Walmart employee wrote on Reddit, “Keep it and give me my $15 already.”

Andrés Arrieta, director of consumer privacy engineering at the civil liberties-focused nonprofit the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said Walmart workers who choose to accept smartphones should turn them off when they leave work and keep a separate device for personal use.

“If you can afford having a different phone for your personal life, I would highly recommend to do that,” he said.

Andrés Arrieta of the Electronic Frontier Foundation said Walmart workers who choose to accept smartphones should turn them off when they leave work and keep a separate device for personal use.Wamart

Like West, Arrieta said the lines between personal and work data are often blurred.

“If the app needs your contacts because your co-worker needs you to call them, the app can’t necessarily tell which contacts in your list [are work-related] and which aren’t,” he said. “It starts getting really complicated.”

Nonetheless, Arrieta said he did not “necessarily assume this a nefarious app.” He said that if companies are going to require employees to use apps, providing work devices for free is better than requiring them to install the apps on their personal phones.

“We’ve seen in the past that employers will force employees to install these very intrusive applications in their personal phones,” he said. “I think it’s a good step that they’re saying, ‘We’re going to give you another phone for free.’”

Bidding for a seat on Blue Origin’s first passenger flight to space next month hit $3.5 million on Tuesday, one day after founder Jeff Bezos announced he and his brother will join the auction winner on the flight.

The flight to the edge of space is set for July 20, and it’s lured about 6,000 bids from more than 140 countries, according to Blue Origin.

The space tourism company kicked off the auction for its first passenger seat last month. Bidding will end with a live auction on Saturday.

The highest bid stood at $2.8 million before Bezos, the richest man in the world with a net worth of about $187 billion, announced he would join the flight.

The winning bid amount will be donated to Blue Origin’s foundation, Club for the Future, the company said. The foundation tries to encourage kids to pursue careers in STEM, specifically the future of life in space.

New Shepard, Blue Origin’s rocket ship, has flown more than a dozen successful uncrewed test flights.

Jeff Bezos is set to be on Blue Origin’s first flight.EPA

The system is designed to carry as many as six people at a time on a sub-orbital ride to space. The capsule has huge windows that give passengers a gaping view of Earth. Passengers will spend a few minutes in zero gravity before returning to Earth.

The Amazon founder said Monday morning in a surprise announcement that he will join the auction winner on the July 20 flight, which is about two weeks after he’s set to resign as CEO of Amazon.

“Ever since I was five years old, I’ve dreamed of traveling to space,” the Amazon founder said Monday on Instagram. “On July 20th, I will take that journey with my brother. The greatest adventure, with my best friend.”

Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos checking out Crew Capsule 2.0 after touchdown in West Texas.EPA

The trip would make Bezos the first of the billionaire space tycoons to travel to space through their own companies. Elon Musk, founder and CEO of SpaceX, and Richard Branson, founder of Virgin Galactic, have yet to ride with their companies to space.

Musk has spoken before about traveling to space with his company but has not yet given a firm timeline.

Branson, whose Virgin Galactic wants to compete directly with Blue Origin in the space tourism sector, has spoken often about his plans to be among the first of his company’s passengers to space. But delays have seen Virgin Galactic’s earliest expected passenger flights pushed to later this year.