The country’s strongest asset—its huge size—is also it’s biggest liability.

NOAH SMITH JAN 3 2014, 7:00 AM ET

China’s fast growing economy will enable it to expand its military and diplomatic reach. (Reuters)

China is preparing to surpass the United States as the world’s largest economy, in purchasing power parity terms. Already its economy is 80 percent the size of ours, and if current growth rate differentials persist, it will take China only about four more years to surpass us. At market exchange rates, China’s GDP is smaller, and is expected to remain less than ours until 2028. This is hardly surprising. After all, China has four times as many people as the U.S.; if every Chinese worker were to earn the U.S. minimum wage, its GDP would be larger than ours. That is not a very high bar. With that economic size comes military power and global cultural clout.

via Why China’s Global Supremacy Is Not Inevitable – The Atlantic.