[ExI] Contrary Messages about European Economy

[Lee Corbin]

Stathis writes

>> America purportedly has a number of economic
>> freedoms yet to be attained by the Europeans...
>> But, as in the preface to 
>> http://www.timbro.com/euvsusa/pdf/EU_vs_USA_English.pdf
>> the [Swedish] authors are critical.  The charts in the PDF file are
>> fascinating.
> 
> The following charts suggest that while the US has consistently been
> ahead of European countries in per capita GDP, its lead hasn't changed
> that much since 1960:
> 
> http://www.demographia.com/db-ppp60+.htm

I looked at the columns for France and for the U.S.  Yes, according
to these, not only has France kept up (rather uniformly)---that is,
the same ratio has not only been maintained, but slightly improved
for France.  (Although my calulator results mysteriously don't match
theirs by slight amounts---that is, the data from the top of their table
doesn't quite seem to match their calculator results for the bottom
of the table, when it should be simply a matter of dividing one
number by another---the same picture emerges.

This deepens the mystery of whose data to believe.  The data from
the table you present a link to, or the Swedish study that I presented
a link to.

Lee