How it’s possible Mississippi and other states that Americans perceive as very poor have a higher GDP per capita than countries we perceive as rich like France

Question

US States by GDP per capita: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_GDP](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_GDP)

Countries by GDP per capita: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita)

In: 322

Answer 1

Two factors here.

First is that you don’t see much about the rural backwaters of France in US media, just their wealthy urban centers. This skews the perception of the country’s living standards.

Second is that GDP per capita and median household income are two different things. If the Pharaoh gets 50% of all the money and everyone else gets to split the remaining 50%, your median income is only half of the GDP per capita, so the population is considerably poorer than GDP would indicate.