The day when Americans could confidently describe the United States as the "best" country on earth are long past, but that does not mean that the U.S.A isn't a special place. There are a variety of things that make America great; I'll focus on three.
Education: First, I believe that U.S. post-secondary education across the board remains the strongest in the world. Of course, some of the best universities in the world are elsewhere (Oxford in Great Britain and University of Tokyo in Japan to name just a few) but I'm not sure there is another country in the world that can boast eight schools of the quality of the eight Ivy League schools or a set schools like the University of California system plus Stanford and the California Institute of Technology provide. Any list of the best universities in the world is dominated by US schools.
Technology: Technology clearly follows education, but requires other things as well. The development of technology requires capital, strong intellectual property protection and entrepreneurial spirit. That said, the U.S. advantage in technology is declining as Japan and Europe gain dramatically by adopting many US practices and by exploiting its weaknesses.
Opportunity: While increasing regulation at every level of government continues to chip away at entrepreneurial opportunities in the US, America is known for nothing if not the opportunity. While I've never read an official definition of the phrase "the American dream" it is commonly used to describe the opportunity to own a home and/or pursue wealth-building career opportunities like entrepreneurship.
Americans can--and should--be proud of their country, but we need to be more focused than ever before on doing the things we need to do to improve the economic opportunities for the next generation because China and India, especially, now have much more rapidly growing economies.
The following fireworks video is intended to help you celebrate the 4th!
230 years is actually quite old for a country. Think of all the countries in Africa -- none except Liberia and Ethiopia is older than 50 years. No country in the Western Hemisphere is older than the United States. Few countries in Europe or Asia are older than the U.S. Italy and Germany came into being only in the 1860s!
Posted by: Vince O. | July 7, 2006 1:55 PM | Permalink to Comment