

Are those who predict 'America is in decline' right this time? - cwan
http://www.newsweek.com/id/234965

======
hga
Ignore the subheading " _Declinists have always projected America's imminent
demise. For a change, they're onto something._ ", it's not supported by the
text, reality, or history, which this author seems to know a fair amount of
(e.g. the late '70s, when things looked _much_ worse).

~~~
Xichekolas
It amuses me that, since it's inception, America has essentially always moved
from one jeremiad to another... and yet every year we keep pretending that
there is something new about this.

According to Americans, things have been "going to hell" for over 200 years,
and yet somehow this time it's different.

On the upside, I think all this lamenting is just a sign of our ambition to be
better... and that is a good thing.

~~~
nopassrecover
Examine both America in the 1920s and America now. Can you say with complete
conviction the American society of now is no worse?

(to borrow an example from <http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.com/> an
easy way to negate the effect of medical/tech advances is to imagine a replica
of 1920s America appearing overnight in the pacific - do you think it would
take this country long to become a world power?)

From the outside it seems as though America has been "going to hell" for at
least the last 100 years.

~~~
Xichekolas
I'm not sure I'm understanding your point, but I would definitely argue that
society now is _better_ than that of the 1920s.

The medical/tech advances alone would make my point, but you seem to want to
ignore those, so I'll stick with social aspects.

Our populace is more educated, less violent, healthier, and wealthier than we
were in the 1920s. Heck, on Wall Street the 1920s was a decade of greed and
moral decrepitude (if you get into that sort of name calling) that is possibly
only rivalled by the 1980s. Go back 30 years, and you are squarely in the
'Gilded Age', where the Senate was completely controlled by large companies
(to the point where the companies simply picked candidates and ushered them
through state legislatures, because Senators weren't popularly elected yet).
After that came the Progressive years, where we learned that our meat was
lethal and other things, and women finally got treated like human beings. How
could any of those decades be considered better than the current one? Sure,
women's suffrage was a great accomplishment, but only because the reality to
that point was so bad.

My brother has a saying... "progress, not perfection". American history has
been exactly that. Sure, there are temporary setbacks (no one can argue the
1930s were better than the 1920s really), and there are local setbacks (1980s
Detroit?) but the overall story is progress. Thankfully the small victories
accumulate faster than the setbacks, leaving us with a better society all the
time.

I guess if we need the jeremiad to motivate us to make progress, then that is
fine. I was simply commenting that it's disingenuous to pretend that it's
somehow different this time. If it really were different, you wouldn't be
sitting around musing about it, you'd be dealing with a collapsing society.

But I guess if you realize that, the jeremiad loses it's power, so maybe it's
better we keep pretending that things are going to hell.

~~~
nopassrecover
I see your point about progress but I'm not sure I agree that everything has
progressed. At the very least it seems as though it has taken us 70 years to
revive the booms in social rights and lifestyle that happened in 10 years
through the 1920s. I guess I just find it hard to look at kids growing up in
LA among regular gang violence, or murders and regular serious violence
happening in schools and say that this is progress.

Some comparison points:

Marriage rates have fallen massively. Divorce rates have risen massively.

% Illiteracy (1930: 4.3% / 1%) (1930 had significant gains since prior decade)
However, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States> raises
serious questions about current literacy rates, suggesting illteracy may be
25% or higher, the point being claiming we are more educated on average is
questionable.

Prisoners / 100k (1929: 98.8 | 2008: 754)

Crime Rates: Statistics vary but seem comparable. This was quite a surprise as
crime rates today are around double that of 1960 (much higher for particular
forms of crime).

Mean income (only counts those who filed, inflation adjusted to 2007) (1923:
$74,102.15 | 2007: $62,369)

Life Expectancy: Much higher now, but general sources suggest this is due to
medicine, not better living (factors such as lack of exercise and poor
nutrition are considerably higher now).

~~~
matwood
I think what your stats and the comment you replied to is showing is that
America has gotten better, but there is a growing class divide between the
haves and the have nots. I'm not talking about the super rich or the wall
street guys, but by and large the knowledge/new economy/professional workers
and then everyone else.

I believe most(all?) people on HN would by default be in the haves. They are
educated and understand what it takes today to be successful. They may be
broke, but rarely poor. Then there is a large group of people who are not only
uneducated in these matters, but they are also poor and have no means or
understanding on how to change their situation. The problem is that the gap
between the two groups is growing larger and larger. How we get those on the
have not side to make the jump is a growing challenge.

------
steveplace
This. Is. Cyclical.

------
S_A_P
funny thing about the sky- its always falling...

Even if we suddenly lost our standing as the largest economy in the world, I
dont see that as meaning we will see Armageddon. It may even do us some good
to let some other country be in the spotlight for a while.

~~~
arethuza
You do know that the EU economy is larger than the US economy? OK - not one
country, but pretty close to one market.

~~~
anamax
> You do know that the EU economy is larger than the US economy? OK - not one
> country, but pretty close to one market.

Not per capita.

Also, the EU punches considerably lower than its weight. Sure, there's a large
pile of money, but what can it do?

~~~
arethuza
But the US isn't top of the per capita lists either.

~~~
anamax
> But the US isn't top of the per capita lists either.

You're right. But the ones that are higher don't have much "total mass".

We've discussed three ways to compare - total GDP, GDP/person, and "how much
can they do". The US is not at the top of any of them, but it's high on all
three.

------
InclinedPlane
"American Empire", if it could be called such, is one of the most unusual in
the history of the world. Firstly, it is not one of direct dominance, as
nearly all others in history have been. It is primarily one of mutual
beneficial relationships, and most frequently of voluntary associations.
Secondly, it is less a dominance relationship and more of a leadership
relationship. Why do factories in Malaysia produce Intel processors, because
of the power of American military might or because of Intel's innovation and
product excellence?

America hasn't retained it's position on the top of the economic stack of the
world merely out of some abundance of natural resources, military might, or
large corporations. Rather, America has proven to be more innovative and more
dynamic than the rest of the world, generally by a fair margin. America has
germinated and grown not just many of today's largest corporations but many of
today's biggest industries. A huge percentage of the Fortune 500 companies
didn't even exist 20, or 50 years ago.

No country has been able to match that dynamism, nor do any countries look
likely to match that dynamism in the near future. The rest of the world is
still struggling to break out of business models that would be more familiar
in 1950s America, meanwhile America is transitioning to an even more dynamic
and innovation centric economic model as startup culture begins to spread and
more and more individuals start to see themselves as and become freelancers
and founders than mere employees. For that reason alone I think America will
probably do just fine and keep its place at the top of the heap in the world
economy. That being said, there's plenty of room for everyone in the world to
be rich, regardless of where the engine of dynamism in the world rests. I
think in the next 20 to 50 years we'll see much of India, South America, and
at least coastal China become fully first world societies, with individual
income and wealth in the same range as that of America, Western Europe, Japan
et al.

------
pw0ncakes
The American Empire? Yes, it will decline, but the OP did a poor job of
explaining why. American corporations won't dominate the world's economic
landscape forever.

As a country, we'll be fine. We won't really notice the change, because our
standard of living will still be improving as this occurs.

~~~
jordanb
One thing I like to observe is that even with the evaporation of the Empire,
Britain remains a very wealthy country with a high standard of living. In
fact, their standard of living is considerably higher now than it was at the
height of the Empire in the 1950s.

~~~
arethuza
I think the "height" of the Empire was definitely before WW1 - by 1950 Britain
was in a pretty bad way.

~~~
pw0ncakes
The discrepancy in wealth between Western and Eastern Europe is due largely to
the Marshall Plan (Eastern bloc states couldn't accept the aid). Without it,
Britain would have struggled to rebuild its economy (and Britain was very poor
in the '50s). So the "American Era" effectively began with the conclusion of
World War 2.

World War 1 was the sign that imperialism might not be such a good idea, since
it led to an effectively pointless war, but it didn't change the relative
levels of power. World War 2 occurred because certain societies didn't learn
this lesson and became even more monstrous than the old imperial powers. After
it, imperialism essentially died in Europe, but was unfortunately reborn in
the US corporate complex.

------
python123
China has been the world's top economic power for the VAST majority of the
past two thousand years. People need to accept that they are just assuming
their rightful place atop the world order. Chinese people come over here and
dominate Americans academically. Their top students now beat our top students
(including Chinese immigrants) in every major academic contest. Theirs is a
society that values intelligence. Ours is a society that praises ignorance.

~~~
rortian
Ummm...

>People need to accept that they are just assuming their rightful place atop
the world order

No, that's okay. Thanks for the suggestion though. I'd love to hear your
theory of 'rightful' places in the world order.

You have an odd view of the world and seem to be very angry. You hate older
people, but revere the Chinese, who revere old people. Strange.

I have met very intelligent people from many backgrounds. Whether they are
from East Asia, or South Asia, or anyplace that produces stereotypically smart
people makes little difference in my experience.

In other posts you have implied that you had special knowledge of Chinese
internet usage patterns. Are you being incredibly disingenuous when you act
like the overwhelmed white American in your post?

