Is The USA Heading For Third World Status?

It sure is gratifying to us in the rest of the world to realise that the schoolyard bully is running out of cash.

Facts about the US that would refute this silly claim

GDP - $13.06 trillion

GDP Real Growth Rate - 2.9%

Unemployment Rate - 4.8%

Population below poverty line - 12%

per capita GDP - $43,500

Hardly third world statistics and hardly running out of cash.

How about the shadow side of your views sir?
Everyone is crunching the numbers to live in a DREAMY land.
By the way the author of the link
is a critical American and not a dreamer

If the export of raw materials is a criterion, then either your author is full of poop, is ignorant of history, or the United States always has been a third world country. The United States has been, throughout its entire history, and exporter of raw materials and agricultural products. Odd that it has taken more than 200 years for that circumstance to have impoverished us.

I suspect you are just eagerly indulging wishful thinking.

Setanta
Usually I used to read a lot before i start a thread.
This author an american like many of the participants here mirrors the fear of many around the globe that USA is slowly slendering into the level of 3,4,or 5th world.

Can you repudiate?
Think about these things.
Infrastructure
Racial problems
Environmental subjects.
Prison population
National debt
cracy consumption
Corruption in the higher level.
Ques before the soup kitchen.
Agressive war without basic decency..
Barbaric nationalistic ego.
Those are the traits of the third world.

Infrastructure: The U.S. has one of the largest and most effective infrastructures in the world. Almost any inhabited point within CONUS can be reached on paved roadways. Even minor streams and rivers are crossed with bridges. Rail lines carry heavy freight throughout the country. Our citizens are so addicted to air travel, that the largest air control system in the world is swamped. Few homes are without electricity or natural gas. Water and sewage systems are highly developed and deliver reliable and healthy water to virtually every citizen. Far from an inability to feed our population, our infrastructure makes so much food available in such a dizzying array of alternatives our population is typically overweight, not famished. It is unusual for Americans to suffer from food or environmental poisoning because the government does a pretty darned good job of keeping toxins out of our lives.

That doesn't mean that the system, or infrastructure is perfect. It is not, but it is far superior to what is found in most of the world today. Our infrastructure is stressed because so much is demanded of it, and our expectations are so high. We have tended to spend money intended for maintaining and expanding the infrastructure on other things because the idea of infrastructure failure is so unthinkable to most Americans.

Racial problems: America is a polyglot society with an unbelievably rich mixture of different ethnic and cultural communities. Americans, like people the world over, have irrational prejudices, but there is no public policy in this land that intentionally favors one "race" over another. The Jim Crow Laws that played a role in limiting opportunities for non-Caucasians have been off the books for 40 years now. The whole notion of "race" here is generally regarded as not Politically Correct, and people across the whole spectrum of our society regard even mild epithets as offensive. Individuals from any "racial/ethnic/cultural" background you might care to examine have risen to the top of our socio-economic system. "racially" motivated mass riots don't happen here. There is no racially defined underclass in the United States, though not all groups however defined are statistically equally distributed throughout the entire mix. Hispanics do tend to occupy the lower wage jobs, and more Anglos can be found holding the top 1% of the wealth. The apparent disparities are always changing and evolving as new generations reach out and grasp the opportunities available to everyone. Some groups adjust more easily to competitive economy than others, but that has more to do with cultural expectations than "race".

Environmental subjects: I'm not sure what you mean here. The U.S. certainly does produce a lot of greenhouse gases that have become objectionable in the last few years. We drive more cars, produce more energy, agricultural products, and consumer goods than most other nations. The nation's wealth and material blessings are heavily dependent upon abundant supplies of energy. That infrastructure you complained about earlier is driven here, there and everywhere by energy and most of the energy humans use at the beginning of the 21st century comes from fossil fuels. Those leaders of those nations with large reserves of oil have become amongst the wealthiest individuals of all time on the planet. Some nations, like the PRC still are heavily dependent on burning high-sulfur coal to drive their economies, and to light and heat their citizen's homes. No city in the United States is so polluted as Mexico City, or Peking, or a dozen other major world cities. No river in the United States is as polluted as the Ganges, or countless other rivers, lakes and streams in such advanced nations as those that belonged to the old Soviet Union. America has unbelievably huge dumps of everything from plain old garbage to radioactive wastes from nuclear power plants, yet most never get into the food, water, or air that Americans are forced to use. American industry may pour out so many metric tons of pollutants, but they are also being forced to remove more wastes everyday. The environment in and around American cities, towns and villages is generally better today than it was fifty years ago, can the same be said for the rest of the world?

Prison population: Yep, the United States has a whole lot of folks in prison. They are there after being convicted by juries of their peers for committing crimes against the laws of society. Those laws were enacted by the People, and not arbitrarily put in place by a ruling religious figure or political dictator. Do a crime and go to jail. Should drug possession be a crime carrying a heavy penalty? Who knows? Perhaps our laws should be changed, and when enough of our people demand such changes those changes will happen. In this country, unlike North Korea or many of the other Worker's Paradises you seem so fond of, there are no political prisoners here. You will want to object that the prisoners at Guantanamo are political prisoners without rights. I don't believe that is a fair characterization. This country is at war with a motley group of religious-inspired terrorists who have operated with impunity from host states, mostly in the Middle-East. The terrorists are not state sponsored soldiers engaged in legitimate war, nor are they exactly ordinary criminals. Guantanamo is filled with men captured fighting U.S. soldiers engaged in rooting out the terrorist training camps of Afghanistan after they hijacked and flew aircraft into New York skyscrapers. Cells of these vermin dedicated to the murder of our citizens and destruction of our country comprise a clear and present danger to our survival. They are not political prisoners, they aren't "guilty" of ordinary crimes, and they aren't prisoners of war, and so they are treated differently as they should be.

National debt: How many nations are there that have no national debt? Where do you suppose the money comes from to build and maintain infrastructure? Do you suppose that a war against a dedicated international enemy whose tactics are terror and murder can be conducted without cost? The American People demand governmental services that don't come without a price. They want more, not less government involvement in the world, and that comes at a price. Even those in this country who are uncomfortable with the size the national debt are trapped by the demands of paying for all that is demanded of government without raising taxes to the point where national productivity would be blunted.

Cracy consumption: Do you mean "crazy" consumption? What is that? Is it "crazy" to want to live comfortably, to have nice things, and a full belly? If a person honestly earns enough money to afford a shiny new automobile, is it "crazy" to let them spend their money the way they please? Probably you mean that in the United States we consume too much, but what exactly is too much? Who gets to determine what a person is permitted to consume? Because someone on the other side of the world has no television, does that mean that Americans should forego owning television sets? Should there be laws that say that no one is permitted to own more than one 19 inch black and white television until everyone in the whole wide world can have something better? Don't you honestly think that virtually everyone in the world would like to be able to consume the same things in the same quantities that Americans do? We Americans are sooo bad being able to sleep at night regardless of the envy of folks like yourself… I don't think so.

Well, that's responses to six out of your ten charge indictment against the United States. Now its time for me to move my imperialistic, oppressive body downstairs to watch a decadent DVD movie while sipping a ice-chilled cocktail before retiring to my comfortable bed ... all paid for by a lifetime of effort and work serving the public. What a wretch I must be for not hanging myself in the garage.

"Third World" is an archaic, politically incorrect term in many academic circles. The current terms for these nations is: developing nation.

So, without playing with semantics, the U.S. is not developing. It has shared its wealth by moving factories to developing nations. Also, by moving its white collar jobs to developing nations. It has also helped developing nations by allowing workers to send money to their mother country.

Is the colloquial expression "sour grapes" still in use?

i couldn't tell you where we are headed economically, but the number of people that want a "third world" dictator certainly seems to be on the rise.

With so many things to accuse America of, and you choose to call it a third world country?

Asherman mentions Guantanamo, one of the things the American government stands for that I am most critical of. It's not the fact that the U.S. are trying to protect their interests but more the fact that they don't feel that normal rules should apply. Laws should apply to everyone, friend or foe.

Guantanamo is a place that sparks a lot of rage and I bet is the cause of more newly recruited terrorist that they've actually managed to convict.

Thanks for your views.
And here are some more views which legitimize my subject of this thread.
Thanks

The US economy continues its slow death before our eyes, but economists, policymakers, and most of the public are blind to the tottering fabled land of opportunity
When US companies offshore their production for US markets, the consequences for the US economy are highly detrimental.
The US now has a trade deficit with every part of the world. In 2006 (the latest annual data), the US had a trade deficit totaling $838,271,000,000.
Now America is a debtor nation. Foreigners own $2.5 trillion more of American assets than Americans own of foreign assets. When foreigners acquire ownership of US assets, they also acquire ownership of the future income streams that the assets produce. More income shifts away from Americans
Americans have increased their consumption by dropping their saving rate to the depression level of 1933 when there was massive unemployment and by spending their home equity and running up credit card .Recently an economist, Susan Houseman, discovered that the reliability of some US economics statistics has been impaired by offshoring. Houseman found that cost reductions achieved by US firms shifting production offshore are being miscounted as GDP growth in the US and that productivity gains achieved by US firms when they move design, research, and development offshore are showing up as increases in US productivity. Obviously, production and productivity that occur abroad are not part of the US domestic economy.
Houseman's discovery rated a Business Week cover story last June 18, [The Real Cost Of Offshoring, by Michael Mandel] but her important discovery seems already to have gone down the memory hole. The economics profession has over-committed itself to the "benefits" of offshoring, globalism, and the non-existent "New Economy." Houseman's discovery is too much of a threat to economists' human capital, corporate research grants, and free market ideoHubris prevents realization that Americans are losing their economic future along with their civil liberties and are on the verge of enserfment.
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_2401.shtml
Inequality has run amok. Do leaders care?
http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/06/27/2007-06-27_inequality_has_run_amok_do_leaders_care_print.html
If This Is Such a Rich Country, Why Are We Getting Squeezed?
The commercial media is telling us two perfectly contradictory stories about the American economy. The first is how wonderfully rich we are in the United States. The stock market's booming -- some analysts predict the Dow will break the 15,000 this year -- the economy is expanding at a healthy clip, productivity growth is up and unemployment and inflation are relatively low.
But, at the same time, we're also told that we don't have the money to pay for a robust social safety net. When it comes to paying for universal health coverage, affording retirement security for our elderly, investing in programs for the poor or educating our children, we need to pinch pennies. According to this story line, we face a looming "entitlement crisis" -- we won't be able to afford to keep the Baby Boomers in good health and out of poverty, we're told, unless we slash their benefits and privatize the programs that their elderly parents enjoy today.
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/57180
Is the US Heading for 'Developing Nations' Inequality Levels?
By Paul Harris, The Observer UK
http://www.alternet.org/module/printversion/57727
Given the nation's tottering infrastructure, imperial overreach abroad and vandalized constitutional process by a lawless executive branch, what will it take to scare the general public, mainstream press and political classes into immediate action to bring about meaningful change?
At this twilight hour of the American republic, there must come a paradigm shift of seismic proportions or else the republic will perish. I'm less than optimistic.
http://www.consortiumnews.com/Print/2007/081307a.html
We are the bees. They control our hive.

The Corporate Greedy have been eating us alive for generations. By doing so they worked to provide for those future generations of trust fund brats with no character, morals or clue about the work ethic -- more George W. Bushes, more little Murdochs and Rockefellers. For that purpose they have driven America into bankruptcy, using all of the institutions we paid for and thought were intended to provide security for us, the real Americans, and our families.
This hyperinflation cycle is the corporate beekeepers harvesting the hive. They are now harvesting America, making room for those of us who survive, to produce more. At the same time they are looking at which bees are likely to give them the best return. They intend that the 'useless eaters,' the elderly, the lowest income people, the inconveniently political, die.
After they finish harvesting, America will be a third world country. The North American Union will be in place to act as their conduit for rebuilding on very different lines, smugly expecting us to be grateful for the opportunity to simply survive and serve.
http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_2453.shtml

Asherman: I think your post puts things quite succinctly.

Halfback

Rama:

and your post also puts things quite succinctly. On the other side of the coin.

My personal take is that the US IS on the downslide, how this will play out, I don't know.

I only note that most great civilizations have a heyday of some 200-400 years. Is it our "heyday" time is over? It is a rhetorical question. I have no answer.

Halfback

Friends.
I beg our pardon for the wrong choice of words in my title.
Please mistake me not that I am anti-American or Anti of any decent feelings.
I always put my views with quotes from the American sources.
Facts should be projected and arguments should be within the limits of civility.
Here are some facts.

Business
Percent growth in corporate profits, 2001 through 2003: 62.2
Percent growth in labor compensation, 2001 through 2003: 2.8
Growth in private wage and salary income (total labor compensation, including health care and pension benefits), 2001 through 2003: -0.6 [Source]

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Children and Families
Percent of White children living in two parent homes in 1995: 75.8
Percent of White children living in two parent homes in 2002: 74.5 [Source]

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Percent of Hispanic children living in two parent homes in 1995: 62.9
Percent of Hispanic children living in two parent homes in 2002: 65.1 [Source]

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Percent of African American children living in two-parent homes in 1995: 33.1
Percent of African American children living in two-parent homes in 2000: 38.5 [Source]

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Civic Engagement
Number of hours of convention coverage each major party received on Al-Jazeera: 13
Number of hours of convention coverage each major party received on ABC, NBC and CBS combined: 9 (three hours over three nights on each station) Source

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Percentage of Americans living below the poverty level who voted in the 2000 presidential election: 38
Percentage of Americans living at twice the poverty level who voted: 68 [Source]

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Number of blank votes recorded by touchscreen machines in a January 2004 election for Florida's House of Representatives: 137
Number of votes by which the race was won: 12 [Source]

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Percentage of adults who feel that "politics and government are too difficult to understand": 35
Percentage of home educated adults who feel that "politics and government are too difficult to understand": 4 [Source]

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Crime and Punishment
Number of defendants charged in U.S. district courts with firearm offenses in FY 1994 (second year of Clinton administration): 6,756 [Source]
Number of defendants charged in U.S. district courts with firearm offenses in FY 2002 (second year of Bush administration): 10,634 [Source]

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[Source]


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Percentage of U.S. defendants who require a public defender: 80 [Source]

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Number of offenders in state/federal prison serving a life sentence in 1984: 34,000
Number of offenders in state/federal prison serving a life sentence in 2003: 127,677 [Source]

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Percentage of offenders in prison serving a life sentence doing so without chance of parole in 1992: 17.2
Percentage of offenders in prison serving a life sentence doing so without chance of parole in 2003: 26.3 [Source]

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Education
Percentage of average public university tuition covered by a maximum Pell Grant award in 1976: 84
Percentage of average public university tuition covered by a maximum Pell Grant award in 2003: 39 [Source]

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A student from a family in the top 25 percent of income with standardized test scores in the lowest 25 percent was as likely to be enrolled in college as a student from a family in the lowest 25 percent of income earners with scores in the top 25 percent. [Source]
Percent of students from families in the top 25 percent of income who graduate with a four-year degree within five years of entering college: 40
Percent of students from families in the lowest quarter of income who graduate within five years: 6 [Source]

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Energy
Ratio of barrels of oil produced in US per day to barrels consumed in US per day during the Yom Kippur War of 1973: 1 to 1.3
Ratio of barrels of oil produced in US per day to barrels consumed in US per day during the first Gulf War of 1991: 1 to 2.3
Ratio of barrels of oil produced in US per day to barrels consumed in US per day during the second Gulf War in 2003: 1 to 3.7 [Source]

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Average engine horsepower of a truck/SUV in 1980: 121
Average engine horsepower of a truck/SUV in 2004: 235


Average weight of a truck/SUV in 1980 (lbs.): 3868
Average weight of a truck/SUV in 2004 (lbs.): 4712 [Source]

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Average engine horsepower of a car in 1980: 100
Average engine horsepower of a car in 2004: 183


Average weight of a car in 1980 (lbs.): 3101
Average weight of a car in 2004 (lbs.): 3462 [Source]

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Maximum number of miles that Ford's most fuel efficient 2003 car can drive on a gallon of gas: 36
Maximum number of miles per gallon its 1912 Model T could drive: 35 [Source]

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Percentage of America's oil supply imported in 1973: 35
Percentage in 2002: 53
Percentage of oil imported by US in 2001 that came from Persian Gulf countries: 23 [Source]

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Firearms
Percentage of households that owned a gun during the Revolutionary War: less than 10
Percentage of households that own at least one gun today: about 45 [Source]

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Number of states that do not have the ability to access mental health records (including records of mental commitments) for purposes of a background check at the time of a firearms purchase: 14
Number of states that do not have a reliable ability to check records for convictions for domestic violence: 22
Number of states that do not forward all of their protection order information to the FBI for inclusion in the National Protection Order file: 15 [Source]

Government Accountability
Number of documents classified in the first two years of Bill Clinton's first term: 11 million
Number of documents classified in the first two years of George W. Bush's term: 44.5 million [Source]

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Amount that federal money going to the average Democratic district exceeded that going to the average Republican district in 1995, the last year the Democrats controlled the budget process in the House: $35 million
Amount that federal money going to the average Republican district exceeed that going to the average Democratic district in 2000, a year in which Republicans controlled the budget process: $612 million [Source]

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Average salary of a state legislator last year: $30,300 [Source]
Average amount spent lobbying one: $130,000 [Source]


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Homeland Security
Number of English police guarding President Bush during state visit to London: 14,000 [Source]
Number of Transportation Security Administration screener positions cut in 2003 due to federal budget cuts: 6,000 [Source]

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Knowledge
Percentage of surveyed Americans who knew the verdict of the Martha Stewart trial: 79
In the same survey, percentage who knew that Republicans have a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives: 56 [Source]

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Labor
Number of U.S. states that provide paid family leave: 1 (California, as of July 1, 2004)
Number of countries in the world that provide paid maternity leave: 163
Number that also provide paid paternity leave: 45 [Source]

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Median weekly wage of full-time workers in 2003: $620 ($32,240 annually)
Percent increase from 2002: 2 [Source]
Median annual compensation for CEOs of Fortune 500 companies in 2003: $4.6 million
Percent increase from 2002: 27 [Source]

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Percentage increase in applications for disability payments from 1999 to 2003: 50
Increase in number enrolled: 1 million [Source]
Peak unemployment rate in current recession adjusted to account for these uncounted and workless people: 8 [Source]

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Living
Average square footage of a new house in 1970: 1,500
Average square footage of a new house in 2000: 2,266 [Source]


Average number of people per household in 1970: 3.14
Average number of people per household in 2000: 2.62 [Source]

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The price of a life, according to the EPA, in 2000: $6.1 million
The price of a life, according to the EPA, in 2002: $3.7 million [Source]

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Military
Amount the Defense Department has lost track of, according to a 2000 report by its inspector general: $1,100,000,000,000 [Source]
Ratio of this amount to rest of the world's military budgets combined: 2:1 [Source]

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Number of U.S. troops who have died in Iraq since May 1, 2003: 720 (as of 07/02/04)[Source]
Number who died in Vietnam in 1963 and 1964: 324 [Source]


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News Sources
Of people who are regular viewers of the network nightly news, percentage who correctly answered four questions about current events: 33
Percentage of regular viewers of the Daily Show who answered correctly: 47 [Source]


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Same-Sex Marriage
Percentage of counties in the 2000 U.S. Census reporting same-sex couples raising children under 18: 96
Percentage of counties in the 2000 U.S. Census reporting a senior citizen in a same-sex relationship: 97
Percentage of counties in the 2000 U.S. Census reporting citizens in same-sex relationship: 99 [Source]

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Taxes
Number of zero-tax* income tax filers in 2000: 29,900,000
Zero-tax filers as percentage of all filers in 2000: 23.1%
Estimated number of zero-tax income tax filers in 2004: 44,000,000
Zero-tax filers as percentage of all filers in 2004: 33% [Source]

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Tax deduction for businesses that buy a Hummer H2 that gets under 10 miles per gallon: $34,000
Tax deduction for businesses that buy a hybrid car that gets 55 miles per gallon: $1,500 [Source]

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Number of years the new increase in the federal child tax credit is scheduled to last: 1 [Source]
Percentage of households that currently pay estate taxes: 2
Percentage of value of estates worth more than $10 million that come from unrealized capital gains (e.g. appreciation of real estate or stocks or bonds): over 56
Amount these estates are taxed on these gains: 0 [Source]

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Percentage of Americans who will save less than $100 on their 2006 federal taxes as a result of the 2003 tax cut: 88
Average amount (in dollars) these Americans will save: 4 [Source]

The missing link is here
http://www.americanvoice2004.org/factoids/index.html

Rama: Nice bunch of stats. Do not get too hung up on them.

For instance: Percentage of people going to trail and requiring public defenders: 80. I think you put that there in the effort to demonstrate that "poor" people end up in court more than "rich" people? Or was it to demonstrate that a greater percentage of people in general cannot afford lawyers? Or maybe it just demonstrates that "Poor" people are more likely to commit crimes? I don't know.

You forgot some more serious ones: Increase in percentage of high school dropouts over time. Percentage of births to unmarried mothers over time. Percentage of total income tax dollars generated (gathered) from top 20% of income earners. (That one might surprise you.) Number of citizens receiving some form of government subsidy (welfare) per thousand, over time. (Same figures for non-citizens might be enlightening, for that matter.)

How about, number of jobs exported overseas and yet the unemployment rate stays about the same, plus the fact that some untold millions of Mexicans seem to have found work in the same environment. HUH?

Lastly, I do contest the concept that "rich folks" alone generate children that have no work ethic, are spoiled and et al. (I forgot your exact condemnation.) Plus, "rich kids" usually don't join violent gangs. Spoiled or no.

Anyway......

Halfback

Halfback
It is not my intention to make the American to get depirited but it is my intention with my meagre source to warn those innocent Americans to see the reality.
The fact is this.
Blind consumption is bad.
Holding credit card and driving a lofty car will never make USA a congenial country.
Most of my relatives left USA with their Money.
Those on the qs to enter USA are persons far and few.
Would you mind to put a statistics about the migrant population from India to USA?
I mean the highly qualified migrants and not the low paid bread earners

Nothing to do with money but something to do with Political admosphere in USA.

"Why are America's global reputation and status declining? It is unthinkable that America would ever disintegrate like the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, its decline is unmistakable. The collapse of the Soviet Union was predictable. It arose from dictatorship. Suppressing truth in the information age became untenable. Therefore the Soviet empire collapsed. But America is a democracy. Why, then, the decline?

The fiercest criticism and the direst projections of America's future emanate from voices within the US itself. Leading mainline critics were inexplicably mute when Iraq was invaded. Today they are baying for Bush's blood. This was foreseen in an earlier article by this scribe, Term Two Trauma, which described how US presidents subservient to powerful corporate interests in the first term attempted unsuccessfully to strike an independent path in their second terms. They failed because they were crippled and disgraced before they could successfully challenge vested interests. The corporate lobby has a long reach. Nixon and Clinton were two conspicuous victims of the term-two trauma. I ventured to speculate that George Bush might succeed where others had failed. Today his reputation is tattered and his ratings are the lowest. But he does survive. He continues to attempt a course diametrically different from that in his first term, though few seem to recognize this. Architects of his first term policy are all out - Rumsfeld, Libby, Wolfowitz, Rove . . . .


The US is a land of migrants from all parts of the world. Inevitably there exists dual loyalty for the US and for the parent country among many of its citizens. This is not weakness. It is strength. It can enable the US to reach out to all corners of the world. Such inter-connectivity makes America the natural centre of a new world order. The US leadership, and thereby the US public, have failed to transform themselves to become the hub of a new democratic world order.

Unless the US leadership and public change track, America's reputation may continue to decline."
http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20071001&fname=puri&sid=1&pn=1

The term "dual loyalty" is not what the voting public has. There may be a nostalgia to one's ancestral homeland, but the voting public is voting for what is best for the U.S. in their opinion.

Foobie
I will be the last person to deny that.
But are you of the opinion that USA is still a power to recken with?
By power I mean
Ethical power
Economic power
Cultural power
political power
Moral power.