Size of U.S. State Economies vs. Foreign Countries
We often lose sight of: a) how big the U.S. economy is, b) how productive American workers, and how much we produce vs. other countries. After all, who can get their mind around $13 trillion, the size of the U.S. economy measured by GDP ($13,000,000,000,000)?World GDP is about $47 trillion according to the CIA World Factbook, so the U.S. economy produces more than 30% of world output every year, with just 5% of the world's population. Reason: American workers are so productive compared to workers in other countries. That's why per capita GDP in the U.S. is $43,500 vs. the world average of $10,000, and why many single U.S. states are equal in size, or larger than, many foreign countries.
The fascinating GDP map above (click to enlarge) matches the size of state economies in the U.S. to the size of comparable countries. You can view GDP by state here, and GDP by country here.
For example, Texas GDP is about $1 trillion, equal to the entire GDP of Canada. Georgia GDP is $363 billion, approximately equal to the GDP of Switzerland. Mississippi GDP is $81 billion, a little bit smaller than the GDP of Chile last year ($95 billion), so the comparisons in the map might be approximate, not exact.
Genesee County (includes Flint, MI) where I live, produces roughly twice as much output annually with a population of 400,000 people as the entire country of Honduras produces with more than 7m people! The state of Michigan produces more output ($376 billion) with 10 million residents than the entire country of Turkey produces with 70 million people!
Thanks to Chapomatic for the pointer on the GDP map.
3 Comments:
This is a very interesting post, but there are very significant errors. Though you make the disclaimer that some of the US State to Foreign Nation comparisons are rough approximations, in some case the statistics do not fit even this liberal standard. For example, The 2006 GDP for the State of Ohio was $397,000,000,000. The GDP of its "comparable" Foreign Nation - Australia - was $767,000,000,000 in 2007, nearly twice the size of Ohio's economy. Again a very interesting post and map, but the figures need some work.
Since you are a trained economist I have a question. I emigrated here in 1993. Essentially because of downsizing and offshoring I have seen the standard of living drop over the last 15 years in America. However GDP keeps going up. Healthcare has risen from 6% of GDP to 16% of GDP. Healthcare cost is not affected by free trade. I believe that the GDP numbers are false. Companies such as Ford, Dell etc have offshored most of their production and development. I think that healthcare as a percent of the economy gives an indication of true economy size. This means that the US economy per capita in real terms has shrank more than half over the last 15 years. This explains why most Americans today feel much poorer and struggle to stay out of debt (or they are in debt). If our politicians had a true measure of the size of our economy then they might be more responsible in wasting money on foreign wars etc. We have had enormous hidden inflation and a concomitant drop in our standard of living.
Are US citizens more productive, or is is simply a matter of skimming wealth from the rest of the world? I am sure that Rome, at the height of it's power and influence, could boast a very high income per citizen. Were they more productive than the rest of Europe? Probably not. But they were in a position to impose tribute and send an army if the tribute was not paid.
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