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That's not evidence of a decline, see http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=US+real+GDP+over+time. That would seem to indicate that other countries are catching up, not that the US is declining. Also, in real terms, it doesn't look like the narrowing of the gap is accelerating (http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=US+minus+China%2C+US+mi...).

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Yes, it shows that other countries are catching up, but every country in the world affects every other country through import/export. If every country in the world were at the economic level of the US, our products would cost much more and every American's purchasing power would go down.

If we put money aside and look at social aspects like education or corruption, I don't think the US has ever topped those charts recently. The Scandinavian countries seem to dominate those types of charts year after year.

The global economy isn't zero-sum.

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