China More Powerful than the United States?
Derek Scissors /
A recent Pew Research survey included a bizarre result: 44 percent of Americans believed China was the world’s top economic power, against only 27 percent picking the United States.
Tough times have made people pessimistic and the media has picked up that pessimism and run, to the point of saying the United States is economically subservient to the PRC. But the belief that the United States is inferior economically to China is way, way off the mark.
Individual wealth is easy. In a very hard 2008, the average American earned about $47,000. The average Chinese citizen earned $3,400. Things in the PRC are generally cheaper so the World Bank multiplies the China number by two and a half. That puts the average Chinese at $8,500. Advantage: the United States, by a country mile.