The British magazine The Economist recently carried a piece in their Opinion section titled “A Year of Surprises” including this section:

“In our Christmas issue for 2001, our panel of economic forecasters were saying that the United States would grow by just 0.6% in 2002, the euro area would grow by 1.0% and Japan's economy would shrink by 0.8%. Figures for the full year are not yet in, but now the panel expects America to have turned in growth for 2002 of a surprisingly lusty 2.4%. Japan's economy is expected to have shrunk by just 0.5% and only the euro area has been worse than expected, with growth forecast to have been 0.7%. Britain is almost bang on the forecast, at 1.6% (versus 1.7%). Australia (3.6%) and Canada (3.4%) have done much better than the panel thought.” [Emphasis added]

FOUR times the predicted growth rate. Either the Economist has a cloudy crystal ball, or the U.S. kicks ass. I’ll choose the latter.