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The macrotrends website says "Data are in current U.S. dollars", so the number I presented should be the real GDP growth rate. I think correcting for populatio

• beefman 6y ago
  "Current dollars" means nominal dollars. Inflation-adjusted data are called "constant dollars". The desired series are here https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD Over the 29 years 1960-1989, Botswana experienced the greatest growth at 11.6%/year, followed by South Korea at 9.6% and Singapore at 8.6%. World growth was 4.1%, and U.S. growth was 3.6%. The worst performer was Guyana at 0.6%. (This among only those countries with available data at the start and end years.) The same comparison for the period 1990-2019 shows top performer Equatorial Guinea at 15.0%/year, followed by China at 9.5%. Singapore weighed in at 5.6%, the World at 2.8%, and the U.S. at 2.5%. Bottom performer was Ukraine at -1.4%, and second-worst was Georgia at 0.2%. Former bottom performer Guyana faired much better at 3.8%. Population does not cause GDP. Adjusting for population will give a better idea of changes in living standards but won't explain the differences in economic growth. Population density may be related to economic growth, and for this reason it may be misleading to compare Singapore, which is essentially a city-state, to nation-states.