"continual decline" is an understatement of how big the decline supposedly is. I calculated the actual decline in my other comment[1]. In short, if their figures are to be believed, the US economy contracted 67% in real terms between 2000 and 2020. That would put US GDP per capita between Guyana and Argentina. Even if you believe the "US is in decline narrative", it's hard to believe that it's been declining to the level of Guyana or Argentina.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31085430

I don't know enough to debate the numbers, but if we're making external comparisons, my first question is whether the calculations for Argentina/Guyana have been altered to match the US shadowstat alterations.

That fixes the problem of "US declining to Argentina levels", but now you have a new problem: did the world economy contract by 67% between 2000 and 2020?

Why would inflation for the world match the US?

Theoretically, everything can be expressed in dollars - and GDP often is - but I think you're oversimplifying things.

> Why would inflation for the world match the US?

It's not, but the GDP figures I was looking up was in USD, so it should be factored in.

>but I think you're oversimplifying things.

Perhaps, but can you think of a plausible model for why our GDP would have dropped 67% in real terms, but somehow our living standards haven't dipped to that of a developing south american/african country? The only explanations I can come up with are:

1. the real GDP drop doesn't exist, or at least is vastly overstated

2. every other country (or at least the worldwide average) GDP dropped by approximately the same amount, so comparatively speaking we're still in the same place relative to other countries

Living standards aren't really that low in Argentina or Chile. They're obviously much higher in the US, but we also have 10x more public debt per Capita, and 5x more private debt per Capita.

That could explain a large portion of the gap...