Short answers, pulled from the story.
Fossil fuel subsidies cost the world between 725 billion and 900 billion dollars in 2024 under a narrow definition, equal to 0.6 percent of global GDP. Under a broader definition that includes costs such as health damage, the total reaches 6.7 trillion dollars, or 5.8 percent of global GDP.
China had the largest fossil fuel subsidies of any country in 2020, totaling 2,203.23 billion dollars, according to a 2021 International Monetary Fund study of the 20 biggest subsidizers. That was more than three times the 662.05 billion dollar total for the United States. Russia followed at 522.62 billion dollars and India at 247.07 billion dollars.
Wealthier people capture most of the absolute benefit from fossil fuel subsidies, since the poorest citizens usually do not own cars. The International Energy Agency has said such subsidies are rarely well-targeted to protect vulnerable groups and tend to benefit better-off segments of the population.
The G-20 nations committed in September 2009 to rationalize and phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption, but the subsidies persist largely because of voter demand and concerns about energy security. Phase-out remains politically difficult almost everywhere it has been attempted.
Fossil fuel subsidies are estimated to cause hundreds of thousands of deaths from air pollution each year.
Ghana abolished all of its diesel and gasoline subsidies in July 2014. That same month, Egypt raised diesel prices by 63 percent as part of a reform package meant to remove its fuel subsidies within five years.