True, but most people don't think about why that is the case. They'll blame slavery (abolished over 160 years ago), or the "exploitation" by capitalists (that produce wealth for all). Some may claim that the US has more natural resources, but The US is rich because of the freedoms and rights that our citizens have. Look at the poverty of the Soviet Union or Mao's China, or in Cuba today.

I cannot for the life of me understand the increasing popularity of socialism and communism in the US today. Those forms of government have a proven track record of failure.

Socialism is increasingly popular because people are seeing that capitalism makes them LESS free. People don't have the freedom to own a home, the freedom to get medical care, the freedom to travel, etc. When they see that many of those things (particularly medical care) are available in socialist (relative to the US) countries, it's no surprise that they abandon capitalism.

Let's consider the economies of Communist nations. I suggest we take into account a bit of regional history.

By any measure, China has come a long way since the Communist regime took over in 1949.

You could say something similar about Soviet Russia. By the 1980s it had stagnated, but the average Russian was incomparably better off than in 1917.

How far have Russians come since then? Has capitalism ushered in a golden age of prosperity and well-being? (Here's a clue: life expectancy peaked in 1986. Russians lived longer 40 years ago, under Communism, than they do today.)

Vietnam has done reasonably well since other countries stopped invading it.

American foreign policy hasn't done much for Cubans, either. Especially in the last few months.

Castro and Ho Chi Minh will go down in (our) history as Communist revolutionaries, but they weren't fighting against capitalism. They succeeded by uniting their people against colonial rule.

(Slavery ended a while back, as you are keen to acknowledge, but Cuba was a US colony until 1959. Puerto Rico still is.)

I'll grant you North Korea is a basket case. But it is arguably a monarchy.