This paper represents a judgment that the relator of per capita income of the countries is a rough indicator of the ratio of labor productivity in these countries. Accordingly, the analysis of the dynamics of per capita income in the United States and Russia for the period from 1861 to present time is made. The described statistical data shows that the ratio of per capita income in the U. S. and Russia has not changed from 1861 to 1913. Consequently, the nowadays widespread claim that capitalist development in Russia led the country into the category of rapidly developing countries for 50 years after the abolition of serfdom is not true. The gap in labor productivity in Russia compared to the United States, Germany, Britain and other developed countries remained unchanged. The sharp decline in per capita income was based on the country's industrialization and appropriate agricultural sphere mechanization. As a result, the gap has narrowed to the mid-sixties of the XX century up to two times, despite the fact those ten years of this period fell out from the normal development in connection with the Second World War and post-war reconstruction of the nationaleconomy. After thecollapse of thesocialisteconomy, this gap increased up to fivetimes in 2000, and now after the first decade of the XXI century it is about threetimes. Thereasons for these changes in respect to per capita income are analyzed in this paper.