Closing the Wealth Gap

by Jack

George Kennan’s Policy Planning Staff wrote about America in February 1948, “We have about 50% of the world’s wealth but only 6.3% of its population.” Of course we were coming out of World War II and many nations in Europe and Asia had been decimated by war, so the USA was poised for success, right time, right place!

Throughout the 1950’s and 1960’s European and South American countries were eager to solicit American industry.  A win-win fr all  However, to counter this, the USSR ( remember cold war times?) portrayed this expansion of capitalism as just another form of imperialism and domination. (Ask any college student, they’ll tell you its true, USA is so evil!)

Granted, imperialism was an incredibly popular concept among European nations between 1600 and early 1900 and that helped push globalism, so it wasn’t all bad.  However, true imperialism all but died right after the end of WWII, but that left-over cold war dogma still continues to confuse lefties.  They confuse the spread of american style capitalism and the new economic globalism with imperialism…it’s not.

Thanks to capitalism and American industry, the United States has remained by far the nation with the most wealth up to now, with $130,764 per person in stocks, bank accounts and insurance, according to Allianz researchers. About 39 percent of the world’s wealth belongs to Americans, while Western Europe accounts for another 31 percent.

However, our financial assets are slipping.  Bet, you noticed, eh? American industry is under great pressure like never before.  Regulations, taxes and unions have all taken their toll.

The United States wealth has plunged 12 percent since 2007. This plunge was only exceeded by Greece who dropped 14 percent.  They are embroiled in a deep recession as they try to dig out from under a mountain of debt.   The US has accrued a staggering 20 trillion dollar debt – that is equal to our entire gross national product! That is serious debt folks, so practical terms we’re not that far behind Greece.

This massive debt reflects our irresponsible political leader and it’s fair to say, we didn’t arrive here overnight. Both the GOP and Democratic Party’s have been grossly incompetent at managing our tax revenues. The truly disturbing part of this story is our debt has been increasing exponentially under the Obama administration.  Another reason to think Obama’s team may be labeled as the most incompetent in our history.

If there is a bright side it was hinted at in the third paragraph. Americans individually are closing the wealth gap between richest and poorest, but so is the world’s richest and poorest, albeit marginally.  This would be a bi-product of American wealth going beyond our borders, our bar is lowered, their bar is raised.   A win-lose.

The take away here is our economy is under intense competition and the debt we’re carrying has left us with very few options in the event of a major recession.   We’re on thin ice and our love for tax and spend policies are insuring this will only get worse, until ….. (kerplunk!)