Most of the world’s wealthiest and best-governed countries got there without super-rapid bursts of growth. Denmark, which has a per capita income of about $52,000 and is frequently ranked as one of the happiest countries in the world, never experienced what anyone would call an economic miracle.
.. From 1890 to 1916, per capita growth averaged about 1.9 percent per year, and if in 1916 you had forecast that this pace would continue for another 100 years, you would have been off by only about $200. Denmark had positive growth about 84 percent of the time and no deep recessions
.. U.S. growth rates at the time were typically below 2 percent, and even lower up through 1860, hardly impressive by the standards of today’s China or India — or for that matter today’s U.S. The big advantage of the U.S. is that it avoided major catastrophe for long periods of time, apart from the Civil War, and pushed ahead with fairly steady progress.
.. It’s hard for economies at or near the technological frontier to rapidly improve living standards, because invention is usually slower than playing catch-up by borrowing technologies from wealthier nations.
.. Many export industries are automated and hence don’t create as many middle-class jobs as they used to.
.. In other words, today’s world may resemble the 19th century more than the last few decades.