In 1988, the US was ranked "the best place to be born." Today it is #16. What happened?

Yep, I think the USA has fallen.

As far as the factors, there are so many I suspect lead to our fall from Grace.

Our economic engine ran out of steam for one....we coasted off the fumes of our ww2 success but only a little while.
Our political system got high jacked by all sorts of nefarious players and crooks in both parties.
Our education system went to hell.
Our American spirit got crushed by vietnam and a whole generation was thrown out of whack because of the chaos of the war and the cultural counter revolution of the 60's
We became debt junkies and whored our jobs and our resources out to other countries
We became tech gods, but in the process of doing it created an environment were all that tech replaced even more jobs.
We became so divided on all levels and isolated from one another, we allowed this collapse to occur because we were too trapped in our own private worlds to really pay attention to what was going on outside our front doors.

Sorry if I come off cranky....I get really irritated about this topic, cause I love my country very much and I know we can do better than 16th place

Trickle down economics is what happened.

Note to liberals all of your social programs don't work. Look it up its called Project FollowTthrough. The only thing that does work is Head Start. That's pretty much it. Look around the rest of the world they do it quite differently. Your approach to race is scorned around the world. Did you know that? Other countries try to bring people together to look for the commonalities not set people apart.

Democrats want the public option like other countries do but guess what you better first figure out why our Medicare system costs twice as much as Australia's and why our quality of care isn't even in the top 50. Six times as many people die from low quality health care as from lack of health insurance.

For all of those who claim the problem is a nanny state look at the list. Those countries above us are far more nanny states that the US have ever conceived of being. They all have nationalized government take over health care, they have strict labor laws, most encourage employees to not work more than 8 hours per day and they have vacations a month long. There EFFECTIVE tax rates are all higher than the U.S. which has the 2nd lowest effective tax rate in the world. EFFECTIVE tax rates are all that count. People who talk about other types of tax rates are attempting to deceive you.

The wealthy took all the money and took away all the opportunity from us, that's what happened.

We decided that GDP no long means Gross Domestic Production and instead went for Greater Dividend Projections. So rather than reinvest in R&D, methods and manufacturing, corporate profits went to senior staff and shareholders. NAFTA and other Free Trade Agreements stripped the tariffs that protected US workers...who wanted their children to have management positions rather than production positions.

While the post war boom was great, not continuing to have a domestic nor global market for what was becoming super efficient production quantities and an unwillingness to diversify manufacturing practices to slow down production by retooling plants for additional operations eliminated the need for the number of factories. Deregulation lowered transportation costs in cross-country shipping that suddenly the rust belt with its higher taxes was no longer a necessary evil. Add to that, no US steel company wanted to engage in a better way to forge steel that was both cheeper and less prone to rust. Japan was willing and suddenly those cheep imports were not the rust buckets they used to be. Then consumers discovered their longer engine life and fuel efficiency.

The 80's were the last days of sufficient single income households as rising costs for everyday goods due to inflation forced families to become dual income households. Children growing up alone as latchkey kids discovered their own value sets for morality, primarily consisting of expensive gifts to themselves as young adults. CD players, DVD players, Video Game Consoles, Computers, Laptops, iPods, etc flourished as top consumer purchases while less legal forms of escapism was used by those that could not afford such higher dollar items.

So here we are today with student loan debt higher than credit card debt, 1) because it cannot be discharged, 2) because the only way to get "a good job" requires a degree to be seriously considered no matter how well the interview went 3) there are not sufficient amounts of "good jobs" to pay off that student loan debt and 5) credit is not available due to the credit score being too high because of the debt to income ratio. And with number 5, no new houses, no new car purchases, no tourism, no investment (which are all big factors to job creation/retention).

But if you want to be political, borrowing money in order to give it to banks to invest in the stock market in order keep investors and other financial market watchers from freaking out did absolutely zero to boost consumer confidence. In fact, more people do not have bank accounts now because of their anger over the whole scheme which they saw as handing money to the rich while doing little for the people in need. Honestly that money borrowed would have been better spent if they handed out $10000 to every US citizen over the age of 18. The banks would have still received it in the end due to the trickle up method of consumerism, investments, small business start ups and rainy day savings. The side effect is, that thousands of jobs would have been created or retained just to keep up with the demands of manufacturing, sales and advertising of products...because the vast majority would have spent that money like they hit the lottery.

reply to post by Ahabstar


Yes, yes, yes.

Especially the part about the latchkey kids. I was not one of those kids, but most of my friends were, and guess what? To this day they can still spank me on any video game on the market....those guys had years of game time I never got because my family was single income and my parents didn't have the money to buy me a game system, they told me to walk my butt to the library if I wanted entertainment.

Sorry I just had to lighten up the discussion a bit, but really...your post touched on so many relavent points!

The article is about where is the best place a baby would be born today, and stated the US dropped due to the huge debt babies in America will face. As to quality of life I haven’t found a place yet to live to even come close to America.

i would rank america with nigeria. unless you can afford to live in a gated community, fly anywhere in the world at moments notice, eat at the finest restaurants and have the best houses and clothes.

but that's not living in america. that's the so called american dream.

keep chasing it off the fiscal cliff, because most people who have achieved the american dream did it on the backs of people they pay $8 an hour.

you have a better chance of catching a stray bullet in america than winning the lottery. or running into one of the 1000's of serial killers running around.

reply to post by Ahabstar


That was a great read and well articulated. I graduated high school in 1988, and so much has changed since then indeed.

16 is not so bad...i thought the US would be ranked lower than that.

This is interesting...I was born in 1990, so I'm assuming that the US would have still been #1 on the list, as it was in 1988.

And really, I think that's accurate. I am glad I was born here, and wouldn't trade it for anything.

But for people born this year? There are a lot of doubts for our future, particularly surrounding the government's finances and the true crises that may create down the road.

But idk, I still think America should be ranked higher on the list. We have a one of a kind dynamic society and culture. Many get bogged down by economic factors and cheap entertainment, sure. But I still think it pays to live in a country so diverse, large, and prosperous. We do still have a high income per capita in the world, and combined with the geography and wide array of people. I like it here.

We could easily be right back on top of that list in 5-10 years, because the next great tech boom is more likely to originate in America than anywhere else.

And, I just think we're at a low point with a lot of potential moving forward in all categories...

(ducks away from all the naysayers who begin to throw tomatoes)

reply to post by PatrickGarrow17


Liberal democrats that can't do basic math

Lack of any morals left in our society - those that still have a job, desperately trying to keep it - those without a job, desperately trying to keep the free sh# coming in.

What happened was that lots of other places in the world decided that being a liberal western democracy was a good idea, just about the time the US decided that being a right wing religious nutjob was a good idea.

reply to post by Happy1

Liberal democrats that can't do basic math

Well that is a real intelligent thing to say.

What happened to America: Greed is the basic reason, that and the attitude of the Yanks who believe they deserve to rule the world, who wants to live with arrogant pig headed jerks. Not saying all Septics are this way but the ones with money who travel overseas sure do behave like pure wankers. Hi Sis, hope you are enjoying LA, see you there in 2014

reply to post by silent thunder


A government that was for the people that went against the people happened. It's no longer about the people, it's about the power, money and greed. Look at the state of the U.S. today. This isn't just one presidents fault, it's several presidents fault. And the presidents that came after are just as guilty for continuing the nonsense. And yes, this includes Obama. And Bush and Clinton and... You get the idea.

When the government resumes to being "for the people" America will rise once again. But that's not going to happen as long as the government and politics today continue as they have been.

reply to post by TheOneElectric



Who is driving the BUS?
The 1%
Who has benefited the most from the policies of these 1% the last 30 years?
The 1%
Who wants to be able to buy the government but not accept responsibility when the system is not working for the best interests of all in the nation?
What country has some of the highest inequality?

The answer is quite plain.

Correction.
We now have a government that steals my tax dollars to favor their cronies, like Obama Cell Phones for the telecommunications industries, or housing for everyone lobbied by the banksters for example.


Was the policies such as the mortgage scam the creation of the common poor American or the 1%?

Originally posted by beezzer
reply to post by silent thunder

 

What happened?

We shifted from a government that used to represent the people to a government that is now supposed to take care of the people.

Originally posted by Trustfund
Trickle down economics is what happened.

Absolutely correct! Notice the date of the first survey 1988- after 8 years of successful economic practices where was the US? Oh yes- #1!

Nickname it anything you like but the economic policies from the Reagan administration worked. Now the only thing that works in America is half the population to support the handouts for the other half.

I guess that POV will brand me a racist.

Is this ranking done annually? I have looked, but can not find the rankings for any other years. Since some folks desire to make this solely about politics, I would be interested to see the U.S. ranking in 1992, 2000 and 2008 (the end of Bush 1, Clinton and Bush 2 presidencies). Does anyone have access to archives for The Economist? I would be interested to see how many spots the US dropped under each administration.

easy question...USA spent to much on war, instead of social advancements and welfare for its people