[xzins]

no, my friend, that would mean that the us per capita gnp was less than 21 grand in 1980. That's not very likely.

Also there is only a 1.7 times growth in 22 years. That's not very likely. One would expect about a 1.8 every ten years with an average 6% inflation rate.

We can probably look up the inflation rates for those 22 years and get an average, but we still have to put it over all 264 months. Even if we use just 3%, we still get a double.

[NutCrackerBoy]

I couldn't find where to get raw data for GDP per capita, but I did find this in the source that Dr. Williams linked:

Today, the expenditures per person of the lowest-income one-fifth (or quintile) of households equal those of the median American household in the early 1970s, after adjusting for inflation. -Understanding Poverty in America (Backgrounder #1713) by Robert E. Rector and Kirk A. Johnson, Ph.D.

That strongly indicates to me that the figures were not mistaken.

[The Old Hoosier]

Well, I looked it up. Real per capita GDP went from $21,531 in 1980 to $33,599 in 2000. That's in 1999 U.S. dollars.

I think you are forgetting that population also increases, not just GDP, bringing down the per capita measure.

21,000 does not sound unreasonable to me. Remember, it's just per-capita, not per-worker or per-earner.