You are comparing a cyclical low (1982) with a cyclical high (1997). And do your estimates include interest?
1997 was four years before the cyclical high, actually. But the 1982 low was in many ways - political as well as economic - a point of structural reversal. Mexico's debt crisis marked the onset of neoliberal restructuring of the world; the stock market took off at almost the same minute as the Mexican quasi-default; and the Reagan boom was about to begin. That was about a lot more than a business cycle - it was about a whole new regime of accumulation.
Doug
