If things are working so well in Europe, why hasn't most of Europe seen any economic growth in two or three decades? That sure sounds like it's severely broken to me.
The GDP of Germany and France are both below where they were in 1995 inflation adjusted (and that was true even before Covid hit). Britain's economy is where it was in 1998. Italy is far below where it was 30 years ago ($2.1t today; $1.32t in 1992, which is $2.58t inflation adjusted). Spain is where it was in 1992. Russia's economy hasn't expanded in 13 years; the Netherlands is in the same boat as Russia, no expansion since 2007-2008. Belgium's economy hasn't moved since 1995. Sweden's economy has grown by about 10% in nearly 30 years (not per year, total; $284b in 1992, which is $564b inflation adjusted; their present GDP is $625b). Austria has similarly seen economic stagnation for nearly a generation. Finland was at $141b in 1990 ($303b adjusted), they're at $300b now. And so on.
If Europe weren't disastrously broken, they wouldn't be suffering such intense and widespread economic stagnation. How long can that stagnation continue before something very bad happens (eg the social safety nets start to melt, as costs climb with demographic aging and there's no economic growth to offset it; growth doesn't get easier as the worker demographics erode)?
While Europe has been asleep for 30 years, China went and became a superpower with an economy larger than the whole of the EU, starting from $426b circa 1992.
> The GDP of Germany and France are both below where they were in 1995 inflation adjusted
In US dollars. You can't use USD inflation numbers for other countries, Euro inflated much less than US dollars in these years. The effect you see where Europe has stagnated given USD levels of inflation is just the effect of USD currently being a bubble. If you use their internal inflation numbers then the economies of Europe are growing just fine.
USD is supposed to be a bubble, because that's how it was designed (at least after Breton Woods). I realized this when trying to figure out when the GDP of China would be higher than the US, and seeing that this depends less on real Chinese production and more on the crazy valuation of USD.
A lot of US economy is not real. A lot of the GDP is based on financial services, real estate, and stocks (including tech), which are pure bubble money. A lot of the economy is also based on health care, which basically doesn't exist is a decent country with public services. The other part is "defense", which means they threat the rest of the world into growing their economy.
In fairness, China has twice the population of the entirety of Europe put together. It's easy to expand an economy from a small base, less so when you're already starting from a decent level.
Interesting stats nonetheless, I wasn't aware that Europe had stagnated so much. Your stats seem a little off; Most of the stagnation seems to have occurred from the GFC onwards, rather than before (using GDP per capita numbers)
The GDP of Germany and France are both below where they were in 1995 inflation adjusted (and that was true even before Covid hit). Britain's economy is where it was in 1998. Italy is far below where it was 30 years ago ($2.1t today; $1.32t in 1992, which is $2.58t inflation adjusted). Spain is where it was in 1992. Russia's economy hasn't expanded in 13 years; the Netherlands is in the same boat as Russia, no expansion since 2007-2008. Belgium's economy hasn't moved since 1995. Sweden's economy has grown by about 10% in nearly 30 years (not per year, total; $284b in 1992, which is $564b inflation adjusted; their present GDP is $625b). Austria has similarly seen economic stagnation for nearly a generation. Finland was at $141b in 1990 ($303b adjusted), they're at $300b now. And so on.
If Europe weren't disastrously broken, they wouldn't be suffering such intense and widespread economic stagnation. How long can that stagnation continue before something very bad happens (eg the social safety nets start to melt, as costs climb with demographic aging and there's no economic growth to offset it; growth doesn't get easier as the worker demographics erode)?
While Europe has been asleep for 30 years, China went and became a superpower with an economy larger than the whole of the EU, starting from $426b circa 1992.