John Grigg rhetorically asks
> So, what accounts for the economic dominance of the United States?
Here are the four reasons that I know of, in order:
1. inheritance of Protestant culture/ethics from colonial days
2. comparitively large degree of freedom, especially during
the crucial 19th century
3. enormous natural resources and a temperate climate
4. a very poor educational system.
Of these advantages, Brazil, which you mentioned, apparently has
only number 4, although I'm sure that number 2 is rapidly
improving.
Libertarians usually forget about number 1, and the impact of
culture in general.
Almost everyone (except libertarians) underrate the importance
of number 2.
Everyone acknowledges number 3, except a few ideologues.
And no one appreciates or understands number 4, so I must explain:
Countries so unfortunate as to have a well working educational
system develop highly literate populaces eager to embrace
idealistic theories. ("A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.")
Since it is so *very* difficult to appreciate free-market
economics, let alone understand it, the people remain highly
ignorant of the mechanisms behind wealth production despite
becoming highly educated, just like Frank Baum's acclaimed
Woggle Bug T.E. (thoroughly educated).
But unlike most Americans, who traditionally had their eyes only
on the next dollar and were completely uninterested in "theory",
the Japanese were very willing to do or die for the Emperor, the
Germans to embrace any wild and wacky theory that came along, and
the Scandinavians and British eager to try socializing everything
that they could think of.
Those are the four reasons that America, even controlling for its
large population into account, began to be the world's greatest
economy since the turn of the 20th century.
Lee
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