that California has very little in common with any of those places, except maybe for the very wealthiest parts of the most developed countries that are still considered “3rd world” (say, the Pudong district of Shanghai, or the wealthy western suburbs of Mexico City, or the eastern suburbs of Santiago). California is one of the wealthiest places in the world, and has a per capita GDP that far exceeds any developing country. It is a motor of innovation and development that has no equal anywhere in the 3rd world. Lancaster or Bakersfield would be considered to be an upper-middle-class city or suburb in most of the 3rd world.

Maybe one of the issues is that the three countries you mention are among the wealthiest and most developed countries in the 3rd world. They are in the upper tier of middle income countries, and are not typical of the Third World. These days Chile is widely viewed as the “role model” developing country, and Panama is similar. Most third world countries are a lot more like Honduras or Congo or Nigeria or Bangladesh or Cambodia than they are like Chile or Panama. Or (to a lesser extent) Colombia.