  We analyze the fluctuations in the gross domestic product (GDP) of 152
countries for the period 1950--1992. We find that (i) the distribution of
annual growth rates for countries of a given GDP decays with ``fatter'' tails
than for a Gaussian, and (ii) the width of the distribution scales as a power
law of GDP with a scaling exponent $\beta \approx 0.15$. Both findings are in
surprising agreement with results on firm growth. These results are consistent
with the hypothesis that the evolution of organizations with complex structure
is governed by similar growth mechanisms.
