How did the U.S. rise to a global superpower in only 250 years but counties that have been around for 1000s of years are still under-developed?

Question

The U.S. was a developing country for *maybe* only 100-150 years. After that, the U.S. became arguably the largest economic, military, academic, manufacturing powerhouse the world has ever seen.

Yet, countries that have been around since ancient times are still struggling to even feed or house their population.

How is that possible?

In: 17182

Answer 1

It barely got bombed at all in WW2 and while the entire world was rebuilding and unable to produce enough, business was booming in the USA on the global scale.