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Ethereum and layer-two user fees

Pick a country and switch indicators on: they all line up on one time axis. You can see what changed together, what came first, where official forecasts point and how far past ones missed. Under the chart: observations computed from what is on screen.

Ethereum Mainnet: user-paid chain feesmillion USD per year519.077 million USD per year 2025
05,00010k
Base Chain: user-paid chain feesmillion USD per year78.232 million USD per year 2025
8085
Arbitrum One: user-paid chain feesmillion USD per year24.924 million USD per year 2025
0204060
actual

Without JavaScript you see a ready view: World — Ethereum Mainnet: user-paid chain fees, Base Chain: user-paid chain fees, Arbitrum One: user-paid chain fees, 2020–2025. Every country has its own page that works without JavaScript (list below); the data is in the API.

How the indicators changed

  • Ethereum Mainnet: user-paid chain fees: 594.692 million USD per year in 2020 → 519.077 million USD per year in 2025 (−76 million USD per year). Peak: 9,938 million USD per year in 2021; the latest value is 95% lower.
  • Base Chain: user-paid chain fees: 88.69 million USD per year in 2024 → 78.232 million USD per year in 2025 (−10 million USD per year).
  • Arbitrum One: user-paid chain fees: 22.029 million USD per year in 2022 → 24.924 million USD per year in 2025 (+2.895 million USD per year). Peak: 63.106 million USD per year in 2023; the latest value is 61% lower.

How the indicators relate

  • Ethereum Mainnet: user-paid chain fees and arbitrum One: user-paid chain fees: too few common years with data (4) to speak of a relationship.

Moving together in time does not prove a cause: incomes, cities, education and the era itself act on many indicators at once. These observations suggest where to look, not what causes what.

Key findings

  • UN projection of 2024: in 33 of 42 countries that already report 2024–2025 data, births are below the medium variant; in 8, below the lower bound of the 95% interval.
  • Japan: 709k births in 2024 (including children of foreign nationals). Even the latest official projection (IPSS 2023, medium) expected this level only in 2042, 18 years later. An earlier projection (IPSS 2002, medium) expected it in 2045.
  • Taiwan: 108k births in 2025. Even the latest official projection (NDC 2024, medium) expected this level only in 2036, 11 years later. An earlier projection (NDC 2016, medium) expected it in 2057.
  • China: 7.92M births in 2025. Even the latest official projection (UN WPP 2024, medium) expected this level only in 2050, 25 years later. An earlier projection (UN WPP 2022, medium) expected it in 2054.
  • United States: 1.60 children per woman in 2024. The SSA 2015 projection assumed 2.04 for that year, a gap of −22%.
  • South Korea: 0.80 children per woman in 2025. Projections made before 2020 expected 1.00–1.38 for 2025, while the 2021 and 2023 projections turned out lower than reality: fertility rose slightly in 2024–2025. Errors go both ways.
  • World: 67% of people live in countries with fertility below replacement (2.1), 31% below 1.5. World population is still growing: the UN expects a peak of about 10.3B in 2084.

All forecast-vs-actual checks →

How it works

  • A source for every number. Links go to the primary publication: the statistical office, the UN, the projection archive.
  • Forecast against fact. Next to a figure: what official projections expected for it and how far reality departed.
  • Association is not cause. Moving together in time suggests where to look; the observations under the chart always say so and check a link not only in levels but also in year-to-year changes.
  • Open data. Every table is available as CSV and JSON to check, recompute and reuse.
  • For programs and AI agents. The same data through an API and an MCP server, no page scraping: how to connect.

Data as of 7 October 2026

Country pages

Each country has a page that works without JavaScript: key indicators, observations, past UN and IMF forecasts against actual data, every series with source links. Countries →