Despite the US’s economic success, income inequality remains breathtaking. But this is no glitch – it’s the system
The Chinese did rather well in the age of globalization. In 1990, 943 million people there lived on less than $3 a day measured in 2021 dollars – 83% of the population, according to the World Bank. By 2019, the number was brought down to zero. Unfortunately, the United States was not as successful. More than 4 million Americans – 1.25% of the population – must make ends meet with less than $3 a day, more than three times as many as 35 years ago.
The data is not super consistent with the narrative of the US’s inexorable success. Sure, American productivity has zoomed ahead of that of its European peers. Only a handful of countries manage to produce more stuff per hour of work. And artificial intelligence now promises to put the United States that much further ahead.
This is not to congratulate China for its authoritarian government, for its repression of minorities or for the iron fist it deploys against any form of dissent. But it merits pondering how this undemocratic government could successfully slash its poverty rate when the richest and oldest democracy in the world wouldn’t.
I’ve also been to China and I also have family from there.
Taking the train from Nanjing to Wuhan is a fundamentally different experience than driving from Houston to Denver. If you simply refuse to acknowledge the scope of public works and economic development, then dismiss these radical changes by citing the exchange rate between the USD and the Yuan as proof extreme poverty still exists, you’re lying to yourself and to everyone around you.
I did acknowledge it.
I said not a single word about exchange rates and never once mentioned the USD. Either your strawmaning what I said or you can’t read.