All the charts that show this are dealing in <i>percentage</i> of world GDP.  This is really a meaningless statistic, and by itself doesn&#x27;t show anything one way or the other about colonialism.  Until the beginning of the industrial revolution, China and India were always 1 &amp; 2 in GDP, because they were 1 &amp; 2 in population.  The biggest innovation of the Industrial Revolution was decoupling production from population.<p>Est. world GDP, 1750: $128 billion - India @ ~22% = $28 billion<p>Est. world GDP, 1950: $4 trillion - India @ ~ 4% = $163 billion<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;infogr.am&#x2F;Share-of-world-GDP-throughout-history" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;infogr.am&#x2F;Share-of-world-GDP-throughout-history</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Gross_world_product" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Gross_world_product</a>