As people in the country, which is now rich and powerful, earn more, that makes them more expensive and less competitive relative to people in other countries who are willing to work for less. At the same time people from other countries naturally copy the methods and technologies of the leading power, which further reduces the leading country’s competitiveness. For example, British shipbuilders hired Dutch designers to design better ships that were built by less expensive British workers, making them more competitive, which led the British to rise and the Dutch to decline.
