Is America in decline?

By Robert J. Samuelson,

Jan 28, 2013 The Washington Post Published: January 27

The American Century is dead. Long live the next American Century.  The subtext of political debate these days is that the United States is in decline — a proposition often portrayed as self-evident. The economy lacks dynamism; unemployment near 8 percent remains at recession levels. The president and his Republican critics barely talk to each other; stalemate seems unending. But what if America isn’t in decline? A powerful rebuttal comes from an unlikely place: Wall Street.

In a report to clients, analysts at Goldman Sachs argue that the United States still has the world’s strongest economy — and will have for years. There is a growing “awareness of the key economic, institutional, human capital and geopolitical advantages the U.S. enjoys over other economies,” contend Goldman’s analysts.

As proof, they deploy voluminous facts. For starters, the U.S. economy is still the world’s largest by a long shot. Gross domestic product (GDP) is almost $16 trillion, “nearly double the second largest (China), 2.5 times the third largest (Japan).” Per capita GDP is about $50,000; although 10 other countries have higher figures, most of the countries are small — say, Luxembourg. The size of the U.S. market makes it an attractive investment location….To Read More……. 

My Take - This is an impressive article and to a large extent true.  However, any economy can be destroyed by those in command.  There was a time when the Chinese were 500 years ahead of the rest of the world technologically.  When the Europeans came they brought clocks with them, which was important to the Chinese in some religious sense.  As it turned out one Chinese scholar went into their historical records and pointed out that the Chinese had invented clocks 300 years before and then forgot about them.  Why?  Because the Emperor's were afraid that continued advancement in technology could undermine their rule.  They then created all sorts of taxes, rules, regulations and bureaucracies to run the whole thing until it was so slow it didn't run at all.  Let’s keep in mind that there were always huge natural resources in every area of the world where there were backward cultures.  Someone still has to do something with them.