God no, hah! Not surprising at all. They didn't have first mover disadvantage. There's a cost to being the first to invent infrastructure. Others can stand

God no, hah! Not surprising at all. They didn't have first mover disadvantage. There's a cost to being the first to invent infrastructure. Others can stand on your shoulders and build improvements, while you're stuck with "version 1.0". Other nations might have instant payments for a good while, but the US had viable banking and a postal service for more than 200 years. The cost of being first is sometimes being last to upgrade. :/ see also: China and trains. edit: come at me!