[Note: this piece was written some time ago and the numbers are those of 2006]
Some people claim that China is the second biggest economy of the world, they give this list as a proof:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29
so: USA=$12,277,583M & China=$9,412,361M
USA= number 1 & China= number 2
But this list is not real numbers, it’s made with statistical mumbo-jumbo which very few people in the world understand (always a bad sign); you can try for yourself at this article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchasing_power_parity
The real numbers come from this list
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29
so: USA=$12,485,725M & China=$2,224,811M
USA= number 1 & China= number 4
But that is not the end of the story, because the US has almost a third of the population as China, this list gives the GDP per capita (per person):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29_per_capita
so: USA=$42,101 & China=$1,703
USA= number 8 & China= number 111
So we easily say that the economy of China is neither strong nor big! But then they say that it is still the fastest growing economy in the world, and that it is growing twice as fast as the US economy, and they supply this list:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rankorder/2003rank.html
so: USA=%3.50 & China=%9.90
USA= number 124 & China= number 9
But wait a minute this is a list of relative growth, what does that mean?? And how can you compare the growth of two countries with these numbers?? You can’t! So let us calculate the growth in US dollars:
USA= %3.5 * $12,485,725M = $437,000.375M ~= a half a trillion dollars
China= %9.90 * $2,224,811M = $220,256.289M ~= a quarter of a trillion dollars
So, instead of China growing three times as fast as the US, in reality the US is growing twice as fast as China!!
And if we remember that China is more populated than the US, then what was the annual growth per person in 2005:
USA= $437,000.375M / 298,213,000 = $1465.4 per person
China= $220,256.289M / 1,315,844,000 = $167.4 per person
US/China = 8.75
The US grew almost 9 times as fast per person last year!!
And still by every news report they say that China is a fast-growing economy!!!
Population data:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population
