Publication of US 2nd quarter GDP data, following that for China, makes it possible to accurately compare the recent performance of the world's two largest economies. The results are extremely striking as they show that in the last year the slowdown in the U.S. economy has been far more serious than in China. Consequently the data shows that while both economies are being adversely affected by current negative trends in the world economy, China is dealing with these more successfully than the U.S. Intense media discussion in China about its ‘slowdown’ is therefore misplaced unless equivalent attention is paid to understanding why the US economic slowdown is much worse than China’s.
To accurately establish the facts, it should be noted China and the U.S. publish their economic data in slightly different forms. It is therefore necessary to ensure that like is compared with like. The U.S. emphasizes annualized change in GDP in the latest quarter compared to the previous one; for the newest data this means it takes the growth between the 1st and 2nd quarters of 2013 and basically multiplies it by four. China emphasizes the growth between the 2nd quarter of 2013 and the same quarter in 2012.
Both methods have advantages and disadvantages. Quarter by quarter comparisons depend on seasonal adjustments being accurate, which is not always the case, while year by year comparisons are less sensitive in registering short term shifts.
But in the present case the conclusion is not fundamentally changed whichever method is used. If the method emphasized by China is used, then, as shown in Figure 1, in the 2nd quarter of 2013 China's GDP grew by 7.5% compared to a year earlier, while U.S. GDP grew by 1.4%. This means that China's economy grew at over 500% of the rate of the U.S. economy. Using the method preferred by the U.S. China's annualized GDP growth in the 2nd quarter was 6.8% and the U.S.'s was 1.7%, which means that China's economy grew at 400% of the rate of the U.S. economy.
Due to the difficulties of making accurate seasonable adjustments in both China and the U.S., the author would emphasize the year on year comparison; but whichever method is preferred China's economy was growing at 4-5 times the speed of the U.S. economy.
Figure 1
If the whole period since the international financial crisis began is taken then the disparity in growth between China and the U.S. is even more striking. In the five years up to the 2nd quarter of 2013 China's GDP grew by 50.7% and U.S. GDP by 4.5% (Figure 2). China's GDP grew more than ten times as rapidly as the U.S.
Figure 2
Turning to the most recent period, it is widely understood that since the beginning of the international financial crisis, China's economy has far outperformed the U.S., even if the dimensions of this are not clearly grasped. What is not so often understood is what has happened during the last year. During that period the economies of both China and the U.S. slowed, indicating the negative trends in the international economic situation. But the U.S. slowed far more than China.
China's year on year GDP growth fell from 7.6% in the 2nd quarter of 2012 to 7.5% in the same quarter of 2013 - a decline of 0.1%, or a 1.3% deceleration from the initial growth rate. However the year on year growth rate of the U.S. in the same period fell from 2.8% to 1.4% - that is by 1.4% or by 50% of the initial growth rate (Figure 3). Consequently China's growth fell marginally but the U.S.'s growth rate halved.
Figure 3
Furthermore, as the Financial Times correctly pointed out in its editorial on the latest U.S. data, U.S. economic growth has been particularly depressed in the last nine months. In that total period the U.S. economy grew by only 0.7%, or an annualized rate of under 1%. In the same period China's economy grew by 5.3%, or an annualized rate of slightly over 7%. Therefore if over the entire course of last year China's economy has been growing at 4-5 times the speed of the U.S. economy, in the last nine months China's economy has been growing at 7 times the speed of the U.S.
This does not mean that the US cannot partially recover from its extremely depressed 1.4% annual growth rate in the last year – the 10 year moving average of US annual growth is 1.8% and its 20 year annual moving average is 2.5%. But even recovery to these rates would leave the US growing at only one third of the rate of China.
The latest data therefore shows that the global economic discussion about the present world economic situation is not about China's "slowdown" and U.S. "recovery". It is "why is China coming so much more successfully through an adverse global economic situation than the U.S.?" And "why has the U.S. economy slowed so much more dramatically than China's in the last year?
* * *
An earlier version of this article appeared at China.org.cn.