The Economic Future of the United States

Since we started this weblog, we’ve often expressed our concern that the US seems intent on losing its economic primacy in the world, and that such a development would have a significantly negative impact on the standard of living that Americans are accustomed to. In recent days, we’ve come across some competing views on the subject from some smart people. Few would argue that the US will remain the world’s sole economic super power indefinitely — the arguments tend to center around the timeframe over which a decline in relative status will occur. We think we’ve found two that are among the best of the bunch, for those interested in reading more about it:

Tony Crescenzi of Miller Tabak argues that the economic, political, and military supremacy of the U.S. has a long time to run, and that this will support the USD and US Treasury debt for some time.

Roger Ehrenberg of Information Arbitrage, borrowing a phrase from Intel founder Andy Grove, believes that the U.S. is at a "strategic inflection point", where soon-to-be-made policy decisions will have a longstanding impact on our position in the world. He makes some interesting points that reflect his background in, among other disciplines, Organizational Psychology.

Both are worth a read as we prepare for the year ahead. In the meantime, we wish everyone a safe, enjoyable New Years Eve, and the very best in 2009. Happy New Year!

URLs:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/28437917 

http://tinyurl.com/ehrenberg