Thanks for this comment - I had a lot to say about each of these comments but they all take too long to compose correctly. This is dead on - a smaller country with a less diverse population can improve itself generally, while the US is too big, too populous, and too democratic to make the same general improvement in its population.

Some decent comparisons (size, population, economies, demographics) are:

Finland/Sweden/Denmark to Minnesota: single digit millions, high levels of education, good technology base, lots of forests, water, and timber, homogeneous population (with recent immigration base). [Norway is similar but distorted by its huge oil wealth]

France to California: similar sized economies and land area, economies include tech/science, manufacturing, shipping, and agriculture, heavyweights in their region, diverse populations (with some tension, little integration).

Russia - Great Lakes region: great universities, high levels of education, but economies not performing like they used to due to deindustrialization. Exports scientists and engineers to more economically vibrant regions. [Also distorted by Russia's oil wealth]

Not sure about what to compare China/India/Korea to. China-Sun Belt might work (recent boom fueled by investment in logistics, infrastructure, distribution; manufacturing as opposed to high tech/innovation; real estate boom; success due to shift in macroeconomic values as much as anything else)

The Upper Midwest-Eastern Europe (Romania, Bulgaria, etc) might be a decent match too - slow economy due to agricultural focus, shrinking population due to few economies, etc.

[GAH! Do you see why I didn't want to respond to any of the comments!]