05 Dec China Overtakes US as World’s Largest Economy
By January 2015, China overtakes the US as the world’s largest economy, with China producing $17.6 trillion versus the US producing $17.4 trillion. Compare this to 2004 when China produced 1/3 of the United States.
Financial Times estimates China accounts for 16.5% of the global economy, while the US accounts for $16.3%.
Bear in mind, these numbers are the result of the IMF’s calculation using Purchasing Power Parity, so any change in currency is not taken into account.
Well, we had a god run – the US was the world’s largest economy since 1872 when it surpassed the then-aging United Kingdom.
FT shared an interesting tidbit I never knew, so I’ll pass it along: The UK was only the world’s largest economy from 1870 – 1872. Prior to 1870, the largest was China.
So we can say today, they are simply reclaiming the crown. Well, they could if we didn’t take into account the relative number of people in each country. China’s per person GDP is less than ¼ of the same in the United States. But a trend is a trend.
Check out the Trading Economics website for economic statistics from around the globe.