If you can't design your own...

[Chaerophon]

...well with EU membership in 2004, it is quite likely, that Poland will enjoy greater economic growth than America in the near future.  So perhaps one could say Poland is developing, while the Anglo-American world is stagnating? Creeping alzheimers on a national level, etc.

Nay, I think not. They're just in a different stage of their economic development. The good ol' "law of diminishing returns" applies here.

As a nation becomes more economically developed, e.g., its capital stock increases, the value of an increase in capital by one unit diminishes at an ever-increasing rate. Thus, most of the most highly-industrialized countries in the world are experiencing growth slowdowns relative to developing/less economically advanced countries who initially experience immense growth rates.

A very simple example: assume that there is a working crew of 10 men digging holes and that the addition of one shovel will increase their production dramatically. Perhaps a shovel can dig four times as much dirt as can a man with bare hands. As more shovels are given to the work crew, the percentage growth in their output will drop with each additional shovel until it is no longer profitable to give them any more shovels at all.

1.)1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 10
2.)4+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 13 (30%)
3.)4+4+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 16 (23%)
4.)4+4+4+1+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 19 (19%)
5.)4+4+4+4+1+1+1+1+1+1 = 22 (16%)
.
.
.
10.)4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4+1 = 37
11.)4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4+4 = 40 (8%)


If you consider Poland to be around, say, for the sake of argument, level five and the US to be around level ten, it's clear that, while the US produces almost twice as much output per capita, its growth rate is substantially lower than is that of Poland. (In this purely theoretical example)

EDIT: hyphenage