ABSTRACT
The number of countries converging towards the income per capita of the United States between 1950 and 1973 is considerable. Its membership includes most of the nations of Western Europe. Within the European club the two former Axis powers – Italy and Germany, ravaged by the destruction of war during the last two years of World War II – grew at a particularly brisk pace in terms of income per capita. However neither of these countries achieved the phenomenal record of Japan, their Asian Axis partner. Japan’s remarkable record of growth achieved by no other country before the early 1970s – Taiwan, South Korea and Hong Kong were to match it subsequently – is known as miracle growth.
