A good editorial explaining America’s downward spiral.
America’s problem right now is that it is not really that scared. There is an intelligent debate about these issues among corporate executives, writers and the thin sliver of the public than is informed on these issues. But mainstream America is still unconcerned. Partly this is because these trends are operating at an early stage and somewhat under the surface. Americans do not really know how fast the rest of the world is catching up. We don’t quite believe that most of the industrialized world—and a good part of the nonindustrialized world as well—has better cell-phone systems than we do. We would be horrified to learn that many have better and cheaper broadband—even France. We are told by our politicians that we have the best health-care system in the world, despite strong evidence to the contrary. We ignore the fact that a third of our public schools are totally dysfunctional because it doesn’t affect our children. We boast that our capital markets are the world’s finest even though of the 25 largest stock offerings (IPOs) made last year, only one was held in America. It is not an exaggeration to say that over the past five years, because of bad American policies, London is replacing New York as the world’s financial capital.
Well duh…
How can the rest off the world be ahead of the U.S.? We’re too busy wasting resourcs by fighting wars half way around the world and discriminating against minorities and gays domestically. Instead of innovating, this country has turned to scriptures for resolutions and answers…
Bush should learn to play the violin.
As a product of the American educational system I’m not surprised that the US population is in the dark about what is really going on — both inside and outside the USA.
We spent lots of time at PS 244 (in Brooklyn, New York) pledging allegiance to the US flag, singing patriotic songs (every single day we sang at least 3 of those) and reading textbooks that told us how wonderful America was. There was virtually nothing in those books about any other parts of the world.
We were consistently taught that we were the “greatest country on earth” and that anyone in their right mind wanted to be just like us. At the same time, we had to be vigilant because there were evil forces abroad that wanted to take away everything we had — especially our “freedom.”
I’m serious. That was the kind of indoctrination we faced from the time I was 4 years old and until I graduated from high school. During the hours we were away from school our television sets repeated the same line. In spite of the pious rhetoric about “freedom”, the Soviets had nothing on us when it came to brainwashing children.
That was many years ago. Regrettably, from many of the comments I have read on this blog, not much has changed over the years. Many posters from the USA are incredibly ignorant about what goes on outside of their own very small world. At the same time, they have the gall to be seriously arrogant and self-righteous about how America has the right, even the duty, to use force — iincluding nuclear weapons — any time it doesn’t like what is going on someplace else on the planet.
Gag me with a spoon.
“a good part of the nonindustrialized world as well—has better cell-phone systems than we do. ”
2 reasons. 1- most of these countries had little or no landline phone system, so it was just easier to build a wireless systems instead. This country is headed that way, with fewer and fewer using the wired system. 2- government bullshit. I’m sure in countries that don’t worry about NIMBY and other impedaments to building their system, they just do it.
what? did you say something? Pass the cheese-whiz and the remote, this channel is boring. 😀
When I was in my late teens (30 years ago) I visited the US in the pacific northwest, 10 miles from the Canadian /US border we stopped for drink. We were asked where we were from, when we said Canada all the people we were talking to asked “Where’s that?”
Needless to say we were left speechless for a few seconds and then we all burst out laughing because we thought they were pulling our leg. They were not, a group of 6 US citizens living 10 miles from the Canadian border did not know about a country called Canada.
Did anyone at the DU read the editorial. It was actually a positive one about the USA overall. Talk about yellow blog-ism.
Yes the rest of the world is catching up, but at least at present, the US has got the right combo of things that will last for a long time to come…
Personally, I can’t think of any other place in the world that I would rather live, and raise a family. Europe? With the declining birthrates, and gov’t control, the overall prospects are not good. South America? India? Africa? Russia?
So blogger, tell us, where would you move to if you could?
Remember the line from Julius Caesar, “Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look, He thinks too much; such men are dangerous.”.
Interesting article. They guy gets it dead on.
At first he throws scary stats around. China and India combined graduate 950,000 engineers every year, compared with 70,000 in America. Did he mention that those engineers wanna work in the US?… and that many of them do? So that means we import brains. That is good.
that for the cost of one chemist or engineer in the U.S. a company could hire five chemists in China or 11 engineers in India;The customer support industry has been trying to use the cheaper Indian call center operators. Many are giving up. You get what you pay for. The best engineers are here, Australia, or Europe, making better bucks for their skills.
Look at what happened to GM. They lost their passion for cars instead they became a widget company who only wants to make things as cheap as possible. It works for a while… boosting the bottom line. But in the long run, it will kill you.
it is a mistake to view professionally trained humans as commodities to be bought at the lowest price. That is fine… if you are in a dying industry that doesn’t need innovation. It is terrible if you want to take risks, innovate, and become an industrial leader.
The world is smaller. Smart people can almost anywhere on earth they want to. So our misson in America is to make the US as attractive as possible to these highly motivated and intelligent people. And we do.
As an Yank living in Australia, I see first hand the angush that Australia feels when their best and brightest go off to the US and UK to work. Many come back when they are in their 30’s and ready to settle down. But the lure of risk, rewards, and a chance to succeed is a powerful draw.
And yes… as a product of the US grade school system, I think we have very serious problems. I did some high-school overseas, and the difference was amazing. The US can do simple things, like implementing school uniforms, establishing “houses” within schools to foster internal academic competition, and stop catering to the LCD of the student body. Not hard, but will go a long ways towards focusing kids on studies instead of what hip shirt to wear.
However… our universities and colleges are kick ass, as the author notes. Our state college systems are, in my opinion, the best innovation the US has ever produced. Unlike the rest of the world, we allow teenagers to be teenagers. We don’t force 14 year olds into “tracks” (university or trade school) that they find they can’t break out of. We rip our 18-19 years olds from their mother’s breasts and plunge them into a collegate atmosphere that allows them to safely discover their strengths and weaknesses. We force them to live and internact with new people. We broaden their world, allow them experiemnt, find their passions, and even go nuts from time to time.
Compare life on a US state college campus with one in Europe… the Europeans take it waaaay to seriously. Every Aussie and European that I’ve meet who every attended a US University loved it. They loved the energy, the freedom, the lack of pressure(!!!), and the zanyness. Trying finding an “Animal House” style Greek Row in Europe!
The author also points out that Americans are living in a time warp when they view the rest of the world. They forget that things, and nations, change.
When another nation implements one of the technologies that the US has developed, they have the luxury of leapfrogging the US. We in the US get the innovations first, and we get stuck with version 1.0. The rest of the world often gets the better version 2.0.
Simple things like banking technology are so much more advanced in the rest of the world. Here in Australia, no one writes checks. Everything is done on-line or with a debit cart (called Eftpos). They are so far ahead of the US banks that it is embarassing to me.
Ditto for Internet access, cell phone networks, and other innovations.
Examples: (1) The US is still stuck with the old imperial measureing system. The rest of the world moved to metric. We aren’t even considering it.
(2) 110 volts AC power. We got stuck with an electrical standard of 110 volts and 15 amps. The rest of the world went with twice the volts (220) and half the amps. It is safer and the still delivers the same amount of juice.
(2) Televsion standards. We have been stuck with NTSC forever. The rest of the world choose the better PAL format.
(4) CDMA versus GPS cell phone networks. The US is still burdoned with a fragmented cell technology system that has prevented many communication innovations from working here.
Yes, we may be in debt up to our eyeballs to the rest of the world. We didn’t put a gun their heads and make them give us their money. They have invested in us because they believe in us.
Sorry Ron…my head exploded. I think your comment was actually longer than the article itself.
“CDMA versus GPS cell phone networks. The US is still burdoned with a fragmented cell technology system that has prevented many communication innovations from working here.”
I think you ment CDMA vs GSM. Anyway CDMA is the better technology and in this case Europe is on version 1.0 and we are ahead of them. GSM is older tech with less channel capacity. The reason GSM is touted as so great is most of the world uses it. By the way, who has the biggest network (not customers) in the US? Verizon, and they use CDMA.
Going off what gquaglia said, CDMA beats GSM hands down.
This kind of hype comes out every 10 to 12 years: We’re behind, we’re losing, we’re Rome, and we don’t even know it.
Let them eat cake. And by “them”, I mean the libs who actually believe this crap.
From the article: “More people will graduate in the United States in 2006 with sports-exercise degrees than electrical-engineering degrees,” says Immelt. “So, if we want to be the massage capital of the world, we’re well on our way.”
#11 The world is smaller. Smart people can almost anywhere on earth they want to. So our misson in America is to make the US as attractive as possible to these highly motivated and intelligent people. And we do.
As an Yank living in Australia, I see first hand the angush that Australia feels when their best and brightest go off to the US and UK to work. Many come back when they are in their 30’s and ready to settle down. But the lure of risk, rewards, and a chance to succeed is a powerful draw.
We have not felt any need to encourage our own children to enter technical-degree programs, because we can still lure the “cream of the crop” from other countries.
We are a great “training-ground” for the world’s engineers – many of whom then go back home to make their own countries a better place.
As Thomas Friedman points-out in his book, “The World is Flat”, foreign engineers who once stayed in the US for long periods are now going “back home” – because opportunities are opening-up there.
Growing numbers of young engieers are realising they can be involved in state-of-the-art projects in their own countries… and there is less and less need to go to the US.
What is our plan for when the “cream of the crop” isn’t interested in an “internship” in the US???
#12 The reason GSM is touted as so great is most of the world uses it.
Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing…
http://cellphones.about.com/cs/buyersguides/a/conspiracy.htm
As a result of our inconsistency, when a company launches a new product, where do you think they prefer to launch it first? Anywhere but in North America, naturally. The combined market of Europe, Asia and Africa is much bigger and more standardized than ours.
#12 By the way, who has the biggest network (not customers) in the US? Verizon, and they use CDMA.
I thought size didn’t matter…
#3: Actually Bush should be playing the lyre… never mind.
The US can’t remain #1 forever. We have only had world dominance only the last 60 years. How long was the Roman Empire around?
Neal Saferstein
A person asked on yahoo answers,
IF his country was more corrupt then the US…
I had to answer..
NOT 1 bit. Its just WHERE the money goes. Instead of paying 10 people to get something done, we pay those on TOP, all the money when we buy stuff.
Sorry to say, but this country is slowly dying.
Until corps start to Give money back, somehow, to those on the bottom. It CANT support those on the top.
When a group of people at the TOP of a corp, are making 100-1000 times those at the bottom, only to SIT on their hands and play golf(delta, Enron, others) Those below them see no cause to HELP the corp. Esp, if there is no way to GET to the top. they would rather take the money at the top, them to even Give the Stock holders the money.
BIGGEST business in the USA… Advertising. you cant go 2 blocks, or watch TV, or even read a newspaper with out Advertising. From comics to the indy 500 to ALMOST every web page..
Our companies have found the utimate tricks, and USE them to make money. The car industry has MOST of the parts made in mexico, indoneasa, and pakistan, then shipped to the US (no imports on parts) and then put them together for 1/100 the US cost to build, and sells it to us, AS IF it were made in the US. We reap NO cost savings for there saving money.
Until corps, come to the understanding that:
They are there to HELP forward tech, the the country, SOMEHOW. Then we are going DOWN a slippery slope, that can never be stopped.
They even point it OUT, that OIL is a cheap energy scource..YEP, and they made BILLIONS in profit from it last year (YES, BILLIONS).
As to the cost of medical., ever wonder WHY??
Its not JUST insurance. Look at the cost of goods and materials. that xray machine..costs ALOT of money, and can PROBABLY is made for ALOT LESS. Medical markup is 100 times cost.
I was at 1 hospital that was useing a SPACIFIC program, designed on a C64(1995) in BASIC, that cost $10,000 for the program IN BASIC. that could have been done on a spreadsheet for ALOT less.
“I thought size didn’t matter…”
When you want to make a call, isn’t it nice to have access to the largest network. Also I forgot to mention that CDMA offers faster data speeds then GSM does. The reason many carriers stay with GSM is they don’t want to pay Quaalcom the royality to use CDMA. Also I don’t travel outside the US and if I did, I certainly wouldn’t bring my cell phone, so who really cares about GSM.
#10…is the “houses” program still around in schools? I remember being in a pilot program back with it in the mid-90s in NYC. I figured it was too innovative to last though, I liked it a lot.
I think these things have been said about us before…
Okay, I hate to say it, but we are one of the least physically healthy nations of the world. We are in $8 trillion of debt at the national level, and much more when you consider state, city, local, and personal debts. We have a 2.7 billion dollar trade deficit. We are addicted to oil from nations that hate us, which is to say, the whole world. We keep getting in all of these wars meant to keep the rest of the world in line. And we have far-left organizations like the ACLU tearing down our society to its core.
…And we have far-left organizations like the ACLU tearing down our society to its core.
Comment by James, age 14 — 6/6/2006 @ 4:35 pm
How is the ACLU tearing down our society to its core? The ACLU enforces the rights enshrined in the Constitution, is that a bad thing? Or, are you suggesting that the Constitution is just a piece of paper impeding America’s growth?
As to the title…
LEAD?? Lead in what??
Sence most companies are getting their good accross the seas….We arent any more.
I would still suggest a change to the tariff system.
The cost of the Tariff, is paid by you and me.
I would rather a MAX resale value given to products.
with less profit margins, there would need to be fewer Middle men, adding to the prices, and more direct sales…ask Walmart..
The ACLU sued to remove the cross from the Rewood, CA city emblem, after the matter was put to the voters. How could an organization calling itself American Civil Liberties Union dare to override the voters???
^
Redwood, not Rewood. My bad.
No gloating, please!
I side with Zarqawi and would bet America will do just fine. The talk about the U.S.’s downfall is neither new nor on target. The fear mongering numbers on China tend both to be inaccurate and to emphasis quantity over quality.
i want to advertize that am giving out loan incase anyone of need loan should try contact me through my private contact
TELE
234 8027852406
mcstephenson20022000@yahoo.ca