Wednesday, May 07, 2008
A note on American decline
This is an important point, and one that is not widely understood among those of you -- left and right -- who worry about American decline:
U.S. share of global economic output (on a purchasing power parity basis) has declined very slightly over the past twenty years – from about 21% to about 20%. But what has really happened over this period has been the rise of China and the rest of non-Japan Asia at the relative expense of Western Europe and Japan.
There's more where that came from.
CWCID: Glenn Reynolds.
3 Comments:
By 
, at
Thu May 08, 09:16:00 AM:
Thanks for that. It has been fashionable in certain circles to redefine words. A decrease in the rate of growth, for example, becomes a "cut". It is refreshing to have America's "decline" more accurately portrayed.
By 
Ray, at
Thu May 08, 06:02:00 PM:
I don't know about the country in general, but it is an inescapable fact that some things are declining. Like, say, the quality of students and/or teaching in freshman calculus at two major American universities.
Just take a look at the texts, the homeworks, and the exams from 3 decades ago (still in the archives, in some cases), and compare with today.
That is perhaps not a huge deal in and of itself (and it is perhaps interesting that, if the quality of incoming students has declined, the quality of research done has not), but it is a sign that there are lots of things we could be doing better. That perhaps the rest of the world has done just as badly as we have, so that our relative position has not slipped, is not exactly encouraging.
By Dawnfire82, at
Thu May 08, 10:33:00 PM:
I suspect that that's a symptom of the proliferation of college education, rather than some decline in the national intelligence or basic education. I think that people get into and graduate from universities nowadays who wouldn't have made the cut back then, in the same way that people graduate High School today who have no business doing so.
In my parents' day, graduating High School was still an achievement. Now it's taken for granted. Soon, 4 year degrees might be as well.
