The typical annual growth rate of world output from 1945 to the 1970s was about 3.5 per cent a year, with Europe usually exceeding this figure and hence boosting its share of world output. Since then the typical annual growth rate of world output has remained about 3.5 per cent, but there has been some variation. In the decade to 1992 the average growth rate of world output was exactly 3.5 per cent. In the next decade it dipped a little, to 3.2 per cent. However, in the most recent decade for which complete data are available, that is, the decade to 2012, world output climbed by 3.8 per cent a year. In other words, just as Europe gave every sign of losing its economic vitality, the world as whole achieved faster economic growth than ever before. 

The unexpected message here is that, for all the gloom and doom about the Great Recession of recent years, and however justified that gloom and doom may be in Europe, mankind continues to advance rapidly in economic terms. Since 1950 the growth of production has outpaced anything that had been seen in earlier eras. If 3.5 per cent a year were maintained over a full century, the magic of compound interest would cause output to rise by more than 20 times. 

The evidence so far available for the 21st century is that economic growth at the 3.5-per-cent-a-year figure is unchecked. The great majority of the world's nations have learned the tricks of prosperity, with the adoption of free-market institutions, and ever-increasing participation in international trade and finance. Only hapless anachronisms, such as Cuba and North Korea, or failed states, like Somalia, Afghanistan and Bolivia, have failed to see the light. But none of these states are big and important. They matter only in that their plight shows that Soviet-era planning, public ownership, autarky and political instability make nations poorer. 

So the stagnation of Europe is not symptomatic of a wider international trend. No, the world's continents taken together are doing better economically than in any previous multi-decade period. Something has gone wrong with the European economy. Of course, many debates about the source of Europe's failure are likely in coming years and no early consensus is to be envisaged. But a basic premise of debates on economic policy must be that by global standards Europe's performance has become lethargic, feeble and unimpressive.