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Check this table. (Per Capita GDP Growth)

US GDP Per Capita grew 56% from 1960 to 1980. It then grew 55% from 1980 to 2000.

The history seems to be this: we are always buffeted by economic, technological, and social upheaval, but our best and brightest manage to lead us to ever loftier levels of economic output.

Our goal should be to nurture the current and next generation's best and brightest so that we can figure out what can drive economic growth for the next few decades.

Fact: The US is a country that has the least amount of vacation days per year then any other county. one of many references

Fact: The average US employee works more hours per week then every other country in the world. reference

So, pretty much it takes at LEAST 3 Indians to do 1 American's job. I don't care if you compare smart people to smart people or stupid people to stupid people.

Try explaining that to my past co-worker who got laid off (along with 35 other people) 1 week after his wife had a premature baby with complications. Explain to him why his job went to India!

Just remember that this "lion" gives more of its wealth to foreign countries that any other 3 countries combined, in foreign aid.

Are you one of those not so smart Indian exchange students? You sure sound like it.

And if they think that we are outsourcing to them because they are better instead of just plain cheaper then why must they come to the US for most of their training and education?

Anyone who thinks outsourcing to India is any more then a political chess move, or for the capitalist companies of America to save a few million dollars a year, needs to rethink the facts. And if you think this is all "Ok", and live in the US maybe it's time for you to outsource yourself!

It's nothing more than a naked political grab, and the EFF is losing mainstream support because of their regressive stance.

Having just read the article, I must ask what the EFF (Electronic Freedom Foundation) has to do with anything?

The paper is from CEPR, and the word "Freedom" in its title is a generic reference to principle, not an allusion to a separate political organization. Compulsory license is related to what CEPR just proposed, and it is something that EFF discusses (but does not directly endorse) on their website.

Totally agree. These are "trade" agreements, not "free trade", as they typically include protectionist measures as well as open-ness measures. I keep posting this, but Dean Baker is an excellent economics commentator on this point.

The bit about removing the "profit component" from medicine could be interpreted as pure socialism.

But what is consistent with RMS's message is that much of the fantastic profit in the pharmaceutical industry can be attributed to the lengthy periods of patent protection they get for their products.

In that sense, the situation is similar to what he's ranted against in the software industry.

When industries or companies become unusually profitable, the public at large owes it to itself to ask questions about whether there are imbalances in the marketplace that hinder competition, increase prices, reduce quality, etc. Doesn't matter whether it's software, drugs, cars, electric power, cell-phone service, recorded music, consumer credit, or battlefield defense systems.

Your anecdote is well received, but you must grant us that you receive more paid leave than the average American. Consider the findings a 2002 Center for Economic Policy Research study:

CEPR Study

Minimum MANDATED (by law) annual paid vacation days:
Austria 30
Denmark 30
Finland 30
France 30
Spain 30
Luxembourg 25
Sweden 25
Germany 24
Belgium 4 (weeks)
Greece 4 (weeks)
Ireland 4 (weeks)
Netherlands 4 (weeks)
United Kingdom 4 (weeks)
Portugal 22
European Union 4 (weeks)
Canada 2 (weeks)
United States 0

Of course, the above are just the minimum legal requirements, in practice, the contrast is even more stark:

AVERAGE Annual Paid Vacation Days and Holidays

(vacation/total vacation+holiday)

Italy 37/45
Finland 37.5/44.5
Netherlands 31/38.1
Germany 30/38
Luxembourg 28/38
Austria 26.5/36
Portugal 22/36
Spain 22/36
Denmark 27/34
France 25/34
Sweden 25/34
United Kingdom 25/34
Switzerland 24.3/33
Belgium 20/31
Greece 22/31
Japan 18/31
Ireland 21/30
Norway 21/28
United States 12/23

Inflation. One of the contribtory causes of inflation (not so much now) is the whole market bubble stupidity of pumping and dumping stocks, particularily what happens after it all falls apart. Here's an interesting piece written, oddly enough, just before the roof fell in. It explains in great detail the effects that everyone investing in paper assets is having on other sectors of the economy, and does a fair job of guessing what will if happen if (when) the artificial valuation disappears (like it did). One of those effects is all of the inflation that the bubble staves off when the bubble rides high comes back with interest (pardon the pun).

Student loan debt is 85 percent higher among recent college graduates who took on debt while attending public four-year colleges than among graduates from a decade ago. Recent graduates owed an average of $15,100 in 1999/2000, up from $8,200 in 1989/1990. Student loan debt increased by 55 percent among recent graduates of private four-year colleges with student loan debt. These graduates owed an average of $16,500 in 1999/2000, compared to $10,600 in 1989/1990 (all figures in 2002 dollars).

Lower income students tend to owe the most money, but the biggest increase in indebtedness over the decade has been among higher income students. In 1999/2000 recent graduates of public colleges from families in the poorest two quartiles owed an average of $13,300 and $13,400, respectively. This compares with an average debt burden for indebted students from the richest quartile of $12,000. However, this debt burden represented an increase of 85 percent for the students from the richest quartile, compared to increases of 67 and 62 percent for poorest and second poorest quartiles, respectively.

"Globalization" means that capital can move where it wants, but labour (ie, you and me) are constrained in where we can emigrate to in order to follow the money flow. Borders restrain and impede people searching for better standards of living while being deliberately porous for capitalists.

What exactly is "globalization" all about? The IMF/World Bank/WTO knowingly bribe local officials to sell off national assets cheaply, deliberately push people into the poverty trap to inflame "social unrest" so that Western companies can buy assets cheaply during the ensuing panic, and "condemns people to death".

But it's not just me saying that. Or those rather smelly anarcho-crusties swinging their dreads forlornly. It's all in the words of Joseph Stiglitz, current Economics Nobel winner and former chief economist boffin at the World Bank. He seems to have done a Vadar and come back from the Dark Side.

Just how badly has globalized moneterism failed to achieve universal prosperity for all?

In the United States, the median real wage is about the same today as it was 28 years ago.This means that the majority of the labor force has failed to share in the gains from economic growth over the last 28 years. That is drastically different from the previous 27 years, during which the typical wage increased by about 80% in real terms. Trade has doubled as a percentage of our economy since the early 1970s, and there is no doubt that globalization has played a significant role in the worsening distribution of income here.

Now, international trade per se is obviously not the issue here, it's international trade under the deliberately poverty-inducing stategies of the IMF-led cartel. International trade could be defined and regulated in such a way as to promote prosperity of ordinary people within economic areas:

Globalization is no more natural or inevitable than the construction of skyscrapers. The globalization we have seen in recent decades has been driven by a laborious process of rule making. It is the establishment and enforcement of these rules that allows Timberland shoes, for example, to make their product in China at wages of 22 cents an hour, and then sell it at the local suburban mall. Advances in transportation and communications did not determine this result. Our leaders have rewritten the rules of the game in a way that has driven down wages for the vast majority of American employees. One may agree or disagree with this policy, but it should be understood as a conscious political choice.
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The same thing could have been done to the salaries of doctors, for example. With much less effort and expense than it has taken to negotiate investment and trade agreements like NAFTA and the WTO, we could license and regulate the training of doctors in foreign medical schools. By allowing these doctors to practice medicine in the United States, we could lower the salaries of doctors and greatly reduce health care costs, without any loss of quality. Interestingly, the savings to consumers from reducing American doctors' salaries to even those of Europe would be enormous: about $70 billion a year.

This is about a hundred times more than the gains from tariff reduction in our most comprehensive trade liberalization agreements, such as the one that established the WTO five years ago. Huge savings could also be achieved by introducing international competition to the practice of accountants, lawyers, economists, and other professionals. But it is unlikely to happen, because these professionals -- unlike the majority of the US labor force -- have enough political clout to protect themselves from international competition.

This Economist article is well-reasoned. But it ignores the underlying fact that globalization means the increasing freedom of movement of capital without complementing freedom of movement of labour, has led to a massive democratic imbalance in the world.

This is because Corporations have lobbyists and expense accounts whereas poor people can only throw rocks.

Corporations prosper while working people are denied freedome of migration and emigration and suffer and end up rotting in huge unemployed pockets of poverty. This is not right and leads to the kind of tensions that I see expressed as fundamentalism in Muslim countries and riots by rich Western kids in Genoa.

Apparently, "unbridled laissez-faire" has got us into this predicament. Maybe it's time to restructure international trade to prevent plunging so many countries into IMF misery?

This is not unprecedented. Before World War One the global economy was very tightly knited together. Unfortunately, this imperial, colonialist and racist system massively benefitted certain countries at the expense of others. What we call today's "laissez-faire" is in fact nothing of the kind but a complex regulatory system designed to perpetuate Western Hegemony.

I benefit greatly from this, getting to eat candies when I want and buy cheap shoes at Payless. But if I had to settle for less candies and knew this was in some way reducing the risk of a suicidal airliner dropping on my head then I'm all for it.

Maybe it's time for a Tobin Tax? Make all those currency speculators produce something worthwhile from their mindless machinations. Donate the proceeds to developing world educational programs....