How far we have fallen
US living standards are falling below those in Great Britain for the first time since the 1800s:
Perhaps we should ask them to take us back as a colony.
LIVING standards in Britain are set to rise above those in America for the first time since the 19th century, according to a report by the respected Oxford Economics consultancy.
The calculations suggest that, measured by gross domestic product per capita, Britain can now hold its head up high in the economic stakes after more than a century of playing second fiddle to the Americans.
It says that GDP per head in Britain will be £23,500 this year, compared with £23,250 in America, reflecting not only the strength of the pound against the dollar but also the UK economy’s record run of growth and rising incomes going back to the early 1990s.
Perhaps we should ask them to take us back as a colony.
posted by walldon | 5:05 PM
1 Comments:
The claim is COMPLETELY false -- GDP-per-capita does NOT equal "living standards", as any student of basic economics would know. The Oxford Economics report does not present GDP per capita adjusted for purchase power parity (PPP), which is absolutely necessary for ANY conclusion about living standards.
Things in the UK are ludicrously expensive by US standards, and so an equivalent average income in the UK -- which is all the Oxford report actually claims -- buys much less stuff in the UK than it would in the U.S. Hence, UK living standards are very clearly lower. This is just a typical case of an ignorant journalist misunderstanding some economics and refusing to retract.
The Oxford Econ analyst was quoted elsewhere (the Observer) explaining a bit about PPP and affirming that Americans have "far stronger purchasing power".
The ORIGNAL posting of this Times article made no mention of PPP at all -- now they've gone back and quietly hedged a bit after getting some abusive comments, but their headline is still bogus.
The idiots at Sunday Times made a complete botch of it and refuse to fess up to their misunderstanding.
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