J. H. Elliott

The two Americas: 13 countries’ GDP

2 Comments / Economics, Philosophy, Politics /

I’ve started reading Guillermo M. Yeatts’s 2010 Plunder in Latin America. Yeatts lists thirteen American countries’ per capita GDP in 2008 US dollars, first alphabetically by country: Argentina 8,281 Bolivia 1,948 Brazil 8,379 Canada 46,826 Chile 10,933 Colombia 5,478 Cuba 4,840 Ecuador 3,770 Mexico 10,278 Peru 4,454 Uruguay 8,942 USA 46,647 Venezuela 4,315 I re-arranged […]

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Empires of conquest and empires of commerce

Leave a Comment / Economics, History, Politics /

In this post-colonial era, what explains the dramatically different levels of prosperity in nations after they become independent of their colonizing powers? Why, for example, has the prosperity of North America been consistently higher than that of Central and South America? Both are rich in natural resources, both involve nations started from scratch, both imported

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