This note draws upon ecological models to describe the structure and equilibrium conditions of a generalized economic canopy consisting of three interactive economies assumed to be in competitive epiphytic, parasitic, and host relationships to each other. The maintained hypothesis is that generally (a) parasites are a drag on their hosts, (b) epiphytes interfere with normal functioning of both parasites and hosts, and (c) hosts must support their own performance as well as the survival of epiphytes and parasites. The results show that hosts must perform twice as better to support the other competitors, and question the notion that individual economies fend for themselves. The challenge is firmly grounded in ample real-life evidence; for example, primary sectors have historically supported economic growth of nations, especially in the early stages of development. In some cases, primary sectors transform themselves and other sectors, as in the lumber industry giving birth to Nokia, and thereby transforming both Finland and the world. In other cases the emergence of tertiary sectors consisting mainly of governments (parasites) has diminished the performance of other sectors and along with them economic growth. The world may be flatter today than it was even a decade ago, but how economies perform remain constrained and/or promoted by individual intra-actions as well as by the interactive dynamics between and among economies.
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