India’s GDP gives us an inflated sense of prosperity

印度的GDP給我們一種被夸大了的繁榮感

For starters I am not an economist and I don’t want to have a self-defeatist attitude. I genuinely want our nation to prosper. However, when I see Indians brag about India being the 4th largest economy, I can’t help but think whether that actually translates into our relative standard of living compared to other countries. To me, it somewhat seems like priding over having a huge population. Sure, we are able to channel it in a positive direction and our growth story is one to admire but I wonder if we have a long way to go before we compare ourselves to the likes of US, Germany, UK, Japan and even China. Barring China, these countries have been able to generate the same growth with a much smaller population which means their GDP per capita and Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) is waaaay higher than India.
When you look at India on that scale (GDP / capita & PPP), we appear to marginally more prosperous than Bangladesh and below the Philippines. If we hit a 10 trillion economy, we can expect our GDP / capita to start matching Peru, Thailand and Equador. Should we then we be looking at ourselves any differently? Is there a more obxtive way of assessing where we stand? How do global leaders see this comparison?
I am still inspired with the way we’re headed. Would love to hear thoughts from people who would know a lot more about this than I do.

首先，我并非經(jīng)濟學(xué)家，也不想抱持失敗主義的態(tài)度。我真心期盼我們的國家能夠繁榮。然而，每當(dāng)我看到印度同胞們吹噓印度已是第四大經(jīng)濟體時，我總?cè)滩蛔∷伎迹@是否真正轉(zhuǎn)化為我們相對于其他國家的生活水平的提升。在我看來，這多少有點像僅僅為我們擁有龐大的人口規(guī)模而自豪。
當(dāng)然，我們確實能夠?qū)⑷丝趦?yōu)勢導(dǎo)向積極的方面，我們的增長故事也值得稱贊，但我懷疑，在我們能夠與美國、德國、英國、日本乃至中國這樣的國家相提并論之前，我們是否還有很長的路要走。要知道，除了中國，這些國家都以遠少于我們的人口實現(xiàn)了同等規(guī)模的經(jīng)濟增長，這意味著他們的人均GDP和購買力平價（PPP）要比印度高得多。
當(dāng)我們從人均GDP和購買力平價的維度來審視印度時，我們看起來僅比孟加拉國略微富裕一些，甚至還不如菲律賓。如果我們經(jīng)濟總量能達到10萬億美元，我們的人均GDP預(yù)計也才開始與秘魯、泰國和厄瓜多爾的水平相當(dāng)。那么，到那時我們是否應(yīng)該用不同的眼光看待自己呢？有沒有更客觀的方法來評估我們當(dāng)前所處的位置？全球的領(lǐng)導(dǎo)者們又是如何看待這種比較的呢？
我依然為我們國家前進的方向感到鼓舞。非常希望能聽聽那些對此領(lǐng)域比我了解得多的人們的見解。