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发帖数: 3365 | 1 History of World GDP
by Barry Ritholtz - August 17th, 2010, 3:00pm
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Via the Economist, we see this intriguing histogram of Global GDP (below)
 http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/GDP-History.gif" onload="adjustimg(this)">
The Economist notes:
“Data compiled by Angus Maddison, an economist who died earlier this year,
suggest that China and India were the biggest economies in the world for
almost all of the past 2000 years.”
But then asks a really silly question:
“Why they fell so far behind may be more of a mystery than why they are
currently flourishing.”
They were the biggest economies because they had a the biggest populations,
and up until 200 years ago, population size was a dominant factor in
economic output.
Once the industrial revolution came along, followed by the information
revolution, mere size mattered less. First the Europeans, then the Americans
leveraged technology to blow out GDP on a per capita basis. Steam engine,
internal combustion engine, silicon makes up for size.
Now, India and China are using industrial leverage, and are moving up in the
world on a GDP per capita basis. |
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