As many observers know, the global economy continues to disappoint, generating lower growth rates than historic norms. Slow growth is nothing new – as indicated by writer Neil Irwin, the world has been experiencing slower growth for roughly the last fifteen years.
In the United States, per capita gross domestic product expanded by an average of two point two percent a year from nineteen forty seven through two thousand. But since two thousand and one, U.S. per capita output growth has averaged less than one percent per annum.
The economies of Japan and Western Europe have fared even worse. The slowdown growth has major consequences for standards of living. For instance, in the year two thousand, per capita gross domestic product in the U.S. was approximately forty five thousand dollars.
But if growth during the second half of the twentieth century had been as week as it has been since then, the number would have only been about twenty thousand dollars. On top of that, to the extent that growth has occurred, fewer people are benefiting.
According to a new analysis by the McKinsley Global Institute, eight one percent of America’s population is in an income bracket with flat or declining income over the past decade. That number was ninety seven percent in Italy.
