At the turn of the 20th century, industrialization in Western Europe and North America saw new countries emerge (or return) as major economic powers. Germany (established in 1871) and the United States were the two countries that began to challenge the established powers such as Britain and the Netherlands on an industrial scale, while France's invigorated banking system compensated for its slow rate of industrialization. This period also saw Scandinavian countries catch up with modernization rates observed in other Western European countries; the wealth of natural resources, increased industrial output, and strong shipping networks combined to allow GDP per capita to grow at rates similar to the United States and France and Germany.

Between 1970 and 1913, GDP per capita in the three emerging regions roughly doubled, outpacing growth in countries considered economic and industrial "leaders" for most of the 1800s. While Britain had been the leading global superpower for most of the 19th century and still maintained healthy economic growth in the given period, the rise of Germany and the U.S. at this time would (and, later, the Soviet Union) go on to shape global economic development over the subsequent decades.

In 1913, the GDP per capita of the United States grew to more than double what it had been in 1870. The influx of migration to the United States allowed for an industrial boom, and high levels of innovation and expansion meant that the U.S. was at the forefront of technological advancements. High levels of exports also brought significant wealth to the country, as the U.S. extended its sphere of influence across the Americas and into Western Europe. Although a severe recession did halt economic growth in the 1870s and 1880s, the decades that followed saw rapid growth, and living standards and infrastructure improved to levels similar to Europe. Growth in Western Europe was comparatively lower than in the U.S. but was still strong throughout this period, particularly in France, Germany, and Scandinavia.

Between 1820 and 1913, the world's total GDP per capita grew approximately 2.4 times larger. The most significant growth was seen in the industrialized nations of the U.S., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, where GDP per capita in 1913 was almost 4.4 times larger than in 1820. The regions of Asia-Pacific and Africa saw the lowest level of growth in this period.

View economic output, reported as the nominal value of all new goods and services produced by labor and property located in the U.S.

Western Europe's GDP per capita was roughly double that of Central and Eastern Europe or Southern Europe in the period between 1870 and 1913. At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, GDP per capita in the west was equal to 3.7 thousand FY1990 U.S. dollars, roughly two thousand more than the other two regions. Of the three regions, Western Europe experienced the largest GDP per capita growth between 1870 and 1900, although Central and Eastern Europe's growth was higher between 1900 and 1913.

On October 29, 1929, the U.S. experienced the most devastating stock market crash in it's history. The Wall Street Crash of 1929 set in motion the Great Depression, which lasted for twelve years and affected virtually all industrialized countries. In the United States, GDP fell to it's lowest recorded level of just 57 billion U.S dollars in 1933, before rising again shortly before the Second World War. After the war, GDP fluctuated, but it increased gradually until the Great Recession in 2008. Real GDP Real GDP allows us to compare GDP over time, by adjusting all figures for inflation. In this case, all numbers have been adjusted to the value of the US dollar in FY2012. While GDP rose every year between 1946 and 2008, when this is adjusted for inflation it can see that the real GDP dropped at least once in every decade except the 1960s and 2010s. The Great Recession Apart from the Great Depression, and immediately after WWII, there have been two times where both GDP and real GDP dropped together. The first was during the Great Recession, which lasted from December 2007 until June 2009 in the US, although its impact was felt for years after this. After the collapse of the financial sector in the US, the government famously bailed out some of the country's largest banking and lending institutions. Since recovery began in late 2009, US GDP has grown year-on-year, and reached 21.4 trillion dollars in 2019. The coronavirus pandemic and the associated lockdowns then saw GDP fall again, for the first time in a decade. As economic recovery from the pandemic has been compounded by supply chain issues, inflation, and rising global geopolitical instability, it remains to be seen what the future holds for the U.S. economy.

Over the first half of the 20th century, the Soviet Union's GDP per capita rose from 1,218 U.S. dollars to 2,8334 U.S. dollars. There was a slight decrease between 1913 and 1929 due to the devastation caused by the First World War and Russian Revolution and the transition to a communist government and socialist economic structure. However, GDP per capita grew over the following three intervals, and the Soviet Union's relative isolation in the 1920s and 1930s meant that it was relatively untouched by the Great Depression in the 1930s. At the end of the recovery period after the Second World War, in 1950, GDP per capita had already exceeded pre-war levels by a significant margin, and the Soviet Union emerged as one of the two global superpowers, alongside the United States.

This study aims at an empirical verification of the historical importance of the German railways on the basis of new quantitative data with respect to the development of the transport system. In this process, older sources which had been widely neglected have been utilised and regrouped.
Within the scope of a leading sector analysis, this study focuses on the mechanism of a continuos industrialisation within the railway sector using the example of Germany. Thereby the theoretical conceptions concerning the economic growth constitute a suitable analytic frame to derive the systematic background for the collection and presentation of the quantitative data materials on the German railway sector. In this respect, the choice of quantifying variables aims at a selective verification of relevant facts in connection with growth-related theories. In conclusion, the author explains the Industrial Revolution in Germany as a growth process fuelled by individual sectors. “The highest aim should consist in a synthesis of economic theories and history in order to allow historians, on the other hand, to gain a deeper insight into the course of the Industrial Revolution in Germany resulting from explicit research objectives and hypotheses; on the other hand, a thorough re-examination of certain hypothesises which have not been proved empirically should enable and incite theoretical researchers studying national economies to deliver newly revised analyses in this field.” (Fremdling [1985], S. 1). By means of a connection between explicit questions and hypotheses gained from economic theory and the above-named systematically compiled data, this study examines the contribution of the railway sector to the industrialisation of Germany, e.g. the importance of the passenger traffic, the enormous expansion of the railway net in the course of the 1840s, and the strong impact of the railway industry on the national economy. Indeed, these factors resulted in the fact that – according to Rainer Fremdling’s findings – the contribution of the railway construction to the development of the heavy industry in Germany has been far greater than e.g. in Great Britain or the US. Furthermore, this study pursues the important question about the importance of the governmental influence concerning the industrialisation in Germany. For instance, the study reveals the fact that military conceptions concerning the expansion of the railway net were definitely only of minor importance. Quite on the contrary, the study clarifies that governmental interventions were more or less an obstacle to the development and extension of the railway system in its founding phase. Among others, Fremdling’s study contains the following important conclusions: (a) The Industrial Revolution in Germany should be considered as a growth process in accordance with the development pattern of the so-called “unbalanced growth” with the railway system as a primary growth factor. (b) In Germany, the railway system has to be regarded as a “ground-breaking” force to boost the economic growth in the 19th century. Topics: List of data tables within the HISTAT research and download system: 01. Average annual growth rates of the output of the German railways (1841-1913) 02. Passenger services and goods traffic as carried out by the German and Prussian railways (1840-1879) 03. Goods traffic carried out by the German railways (1880-1913) 04. The passenger transport by German railways (1880-1913) 05. Profits resulting from the passenger and goods traffic by the German and Prussian railways (1840-1879) 06. Proportion of the employees in the railway sector (construction and operation) as compared to the national economy, and in comparison to the other sectors in Germany (1849-1879) 07. Work force and their income in the German railway services (1840-1879) 08. Work force and their income in the Prussian railway services (1840-1879) 09. Proportion of the value creation in the railway sector as compared to the German national economy/trade and industry (1850-1879) 10. Value creation of German and Prussian railways at the respective contemporary prices (1840-1879) 11. The capital stock of the German and Prussian railways as compared to the related purchase prices (investment capital) between 1840 and 1879 12. Capital stock as compared to the purchase prices (investment capital) and work force of the German railway system (1880-1913) 13. Proportion of the capital stock of the railway services at purchase prices as compared to the national economy/trade and industry (1850-1913) 14. The net investment of the German and Prussian railways at the respective contemporary prices (1841-1879) 14. The expenditure of the German and Prussian railways at the respective contemporary prices (1841-1879) 16. Proportion of the net investment of the railway sector as compared to the national economy/trade and industry in Germany (1851-1879) 17. Productivity, output, and input of the German railway services...