US mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people

As American mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people climbed toward and then past 100, China was filing patents at a rate that kept perfect pace.

U.S. mobile phone subscriptions per 100 people grew from around 89 in 2010 to over 115 by 2021. Chinese resident patent applications grew from roughly 391,000 in 2010 to over 1.5 million by 2021. Both trends are expressions of the 2010s technology decade.

Patents and phone subscriptions both count things that may or may not reflect what they appear to measure. That they rhyme numerically across a decade tells you more about the shape of the 2010s than about any relationship.