Bangkok Post
Column: FINANCIAL CRISIS

The United State and European countries, powerful nations for such a long time, are now grappling with the economic downturn arising from the financial crisis.

Moreover, there are signs that economic momentum has already shifted gradually to many emerging countries.

For instance, Arvind Subramanian last year found that the US and Western countries dominated the global economy in the 1870s. In 1973, Japan replaced German as the world's second-largest economy.

Then in 2010, China overtook Japan, with the US was still leading the way. However, it is expected that China will become the world's largest economy in 2030, with the US in second place and India in third _ the European nations will have fallen further by then.