Every time you zoom in on a fractal, it presents the same pattern on a different scale. This scale dependence makes it impossible to clearly separate between places that would benefit from Type I vs Type II progress.
In the United States you would expect California to be right on the knowledge frontier - it’s the wealthiest state with the most progressive policies. Yet there are still tons of farm workers who live lives comparable to residents of developing nations - they clearly are not at the frontier and would benefit more from Type II progress than Type I progress.
Zoom in farther to the San Francisco Bay Area. In only a few square miles there are people pushing the limits of quantum technology and infrastructure and policies that look like something out of a developing nation.^1
You can’t even say that individuals are the quanta of where type I vs. type II progress happens. Many researchers on the cutting edge of science follow dietary guidelines from the 1970’s.
This inability to cleanly separate the two types of progress geographically adds evidence to the fact that “Should we focus on Type I or Type II progress?” is the wrong question.
Another consequence of this fractal nature of progress is that 1 with developed and developing nations.
In other words they are Nebulous