From Wikipedia:
Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the market value of all final goods and services produced in a period (quarterly or yearly).
National net wealth, is the total sum value of monetary assets minus liabilities of a given nation. It refers to the total value of wealth possessed by the citizens of a nation at a set point in time.
Being a super neofite (to say the least) in Economics my very naive question is: why is GDP always used in place of National net wealth to denote the economical superiority of a country versus another?
To put it in the way I interpret it: how a country producing 10 cars per year is economically superior to another country not producing any car at all but holding a giant reserve of gold (that could be employed to build 1000 cars factories the next day) ?