Short answers, pulled from the story.
The G7 originated on the 25th of March 1973 when United States secretary of the treasury George Shultz convened an informal gathering in a library on the ground floor of the White House. This initial meeting included finance ministers from West Germany, France, and the United Kingdom before Richard Nixon offered the venue for economic stability discussions following the oil crisis.
The current seven-member body consists of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The European Union also participates through its Commission president since 1977 and its Council president regularly since 2009.
Russia joined the group in 1998 after informal meetings began in 1994 but membership was suspended in March 2014 following Crimea's annexation. Vladimir Putin delivered a speech at the Munich Security Conference in February 2007 that signaled growing tensions leading to Russia announcing it would permanently leave the G8 in January 2017.
A global minimum corporate tax rate of 15% reached provisional agreement in June 2021 while climate commitments include plans to close all coal power plants by 2030 or 2035 unless emissions are captured. Leaders agreed in April 2024 to phase out coal infrastructure within the next decade.
The combined population of G7 countries reaches approximately 780 million people representing nearly 10% of the global total as of 2024. These nations hold around 50% of worldwide nominal net wealth according to recent data and account for more than 44% of world nominal GDP figures.