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US is World's Most Competitive Economy for First Time in a Decade (wsj.com)
schwit1 shares a report: The U.S. is back on top as the most competitive country in the world, regaining the No. 1 spot for the first time since 2008 in an index produced by the World Economic Forum [Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source], which said the country could still do better on social issues. America climbed one place in the rankings of 140 countries, with the top five rounded out by Singapore, Germany, Switzerland and Japan. All five countries' scores rose from 2017, with the U.S. notching the second-biggest gain after Japan's. [...] The Global Competitiveness Report this year assessed 140 countries on 98 indicators that measure business investment and productivity. The indicators are organized into 12 main drivers of productivity including the nations' institutions, tech savvy, infrastructure, education systems, market size and innovation.
We even know how to use Unicode on the web.
Woo! Victory lap!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
That's whats up!
The US has had a trade deficit since the '70s, and still does. What is the value of 'most competitive' if you have to borrow money from the rest of the world in order to pay for your imports ?
LOL @ gender studies. Ohh the stupid hurts!
Sounds like another of those bullshit evaluations in which you can make the order come out how you like depending what weight you attach to the measured parameters - even assuming they are measured correctly (or guessed) in the first place. For example, FTFA :
This year the WEF changed its methodology to better account for ... [blah blah, blah .....]
From the first article:
"The last time the U.S. topped the list was 2008".
I rest my case.
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
Obama, 2015: Those jobs are never coming back.
<Trump beats Hillary!, starts rolling back out-of-control regulatory state, jobs start coming back>
Obama, 2018: I built that!
Yeah, sure you did. Go back to your "War on coal."
Thanks Obama!
More seriously, a Republican controlled House and Senate is the constant in this equation. So thanks GOP!
Analogically speaking... That's like saying that the ONE olympic star on television winning medals is representative that everyone sitting on their couch eating potato chips watching them perform, are also winning medals.
What is a competitive economy really when for thirty or fourty years, the economy of the PEOPLE has been GUTTED by the corporations and politics supporting them?
Fucking hogwash!
This seems relevant:
https://www.tni.org/en/publication/who-does-the-world-economic-forum-really-represent
You’re repeating old fake news. Bush never said that.
“Thermonuclear war not quite as imminent as it used to be” is still a long way from “reuniting Korea.”
It's funny how that gets repeated even though the last time we were number 1 was 2008.
If we enter a recession within the next 2 or 6 years, and especially if Obama-era stimulus isn't feasible due to already low interest rates and increased debt & deficits, will you assign any of the blame to Trump?
I'm guessing it'll all be democrats fault, even if they control only the house and can't pass legislation. Even if Republicans manage to hold onto the house and senate next month, will you somehow still try to assign the blame for any downturn to wild conspiracy theories involving Hillary Clinton?
If this current ~3% annual growth, which began back in mid-2009 during Obama's first term, continues with interruption for 6 more years, then Trump will indeed deserve substantial credit, regardless of how distasteful his personality and how childish his Twitter rants may be.
But at this moment, when the USA is most able to pay down its massive accumulated debt and put itself on a financially sound course, Trump and republicans (who repeatedly called for a balanced budget when democrats held power) are racking up huge deficits that are just piling on more debt. They're deregulating the financial sector, which has allowed massive buildup of consumer and student debt. Massive consumer debt, overly leveraged by the deregulated financial "industry" is what caused the great recession 10 years ago (near the end of Bush's tenure). Collectively we all should have learned a lesson, but sadly it seems we didn't.
PJRC: Electronic Projects, 8051 Microcontroller Tools
Spelling mistake, it's not "jeremyp" it's "jeremynpc"
FTFY.
Grow the fuck up and quit regurgitating childish TDS-fueled crybully bullshit.
Or does it hurt too fucking much that Obama's 8 years of "remaking the US economy (based on dated, stale, and failed 19th century "progressive" redistributionist ideals...)" didn't work?
Unemployment, which has continued the same trend without an inflection point since recovery started before Trump, is all there is to talk about. All those corporate tax savings benefited the wealthy. Mostly used for stock buybacks. Wages are flat. There was no cut in government spending, so Trump's giveaway to the already-wealthy resulted in a large increase in deficit, expected to top $1 trillion next year. Meanwhile, tariffs are hurting many sectors significantly, as well as the poor and middle class, who are hurt by the price increases. The bailout to farmers hurt by the tariffs wasn't nearly sufficient by their own account. The trade war is only going to get worse. Manufacturing still isn't coming back.
But yeah, keep harping on the unemployment figure, because that's what most important. And to still think Trump has any business savvy whatsoever, after he underperformed the market, lied about being self-made, got bailed out by his father countless times... ugh, the delusion.
With so many pretending that they actually know how the economy works please find US Federal Reserve Act.
I'm still trying to figure it out myself. Somehow though, I think presidents are more the tail than they are the dog.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Indeed... 779 billion dollars deficit for the first year of the Trump administration.
That's between tax breaks for the rich and spending even more on "defense".
Guess who's going to have to pay that back? I'll bet it won't be Trump's rich friends.
You believe in the market?
Yes? Then there is no "Job Creator". There are people who purchase products from people who make products. Those who make products would not make them ( and hence would not "create jobs" ) if it were not for those people purchasing products. All the "Job Creator" does is stand in the middle and collect.
Job creation is based on demand which is based on purchasing, which is based, by and large, on massive numbers of people.
emt 377 emt 4
Nope - never happened.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
I agree with your sentiment except that I think it's Progressivism that's failed rather than Liberalism.
The bottom line is Presidents have a relatively small short-term impact on the economy. The boom/bust cycle has been showing its face for more than a 100 years and I doubt any President can stop the cycle; only tweak it around the edges (not always in good ways).
Economies are also affected by other nations' economies, OPEC decisions, and war.
Presidents do affect things like deficits and regulations, but these typically won't change the economy much in the short term.
(I suppose deregulation can act as a stimulus, but it's not fun to be poisoned even if it increases profits for somebody else. Birth defects and injuries do improve medical economies just as breaking windows increases repair jobs. But if enough people are poisoned with heavy metals or hurt on the job, our economy won't be competitive.)
Table-ized A.I.
If this current ~3% annual growth, which began back in mid-2009 during Obama's first term
It did? I don't see a single year that reached 3% since 2005.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Nice fiction. Under Obama, the economy added 11.6 million jobs, and brought employment down to below-average levels. In fact, by every metric I'm aware of, the economy did well under Obama.
Trump, apart from a lot of bluster and some ill-conceived tariffs, has done remarkably little to affect the economy, so it makes sense that it s continuing to improve as it did under Obama. Sometimes, the right thing to do is nothing.
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This is what happens when you put a true entrapeneur, and verified job creator with business savvy and acumen, into office rather than the career politicians we are used to that simply are trying to stretch things out for a nice pension. Trump has brought old school competitive spirit and American agressiveness back into the White House. Say what you will about his personality or personal decisions but the man is a bulldog when it comes to business and all Americans are now reaping the rewards with record low jobless rates, more job openings than there are people to fill them, and record low taxes. It's simply amazing to me when I think about what is going to be possible with 6 more years of this environment.
You overestimate the amount of control a US president has over the economy. All that Trump did is lower taxes, and while this will always provide a short-term boost to any economy, at this current time I think it was a bad move.
The reason is that the economy is already showing signs of overheating. Look at the NASDAQ and DOW over the last 10 years: up, up, up. The economy was already improving greatly after the financial crisis during the Obama years. There is so much cash moving around, the stock markets have basically exploded and are overdue for a big correction. The last thing you want to do in a situation like this, is infuse even more money into the economy. It will just delay the correction and make the resulting crash and shock to the economy that much harder. Also, the tax cuts will further increase the already immense pile of debt. So what Trump is doing is buying a short-term economic boost that is not needed and actually detrimental over the medium term with more debt for future generations.
You can call that genius entrepreneurship, but really you don't need to be a genius to know that tax cuts boost the economy. What matters is the timing and the context, which in my opinion couldn't be worse right now.
But I'm sure we will see the results of that pretty soon. Maybe in time for Trumps reelection(?).
Wage growth is up.
Unemployment bottomed out at 5% for the last year of the Obama Administration, then plunged after the election.
GDP was plunging during 2015/2016 and has since turned around.
The DJIA plateaued during 2015 and 2016 and exploded after the election.
NASDAQ followed the same trend as the DJIA, indicating the flat-line in growth was economy-wide, not just specific sectors
Manufacturing job growth is at a 23 year high
Basically you're making stuff up - the facts do not support your positions.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
FYI: The "Those jobs are never coming back" quote was from Steve Jobs when Obama asked him if iPhones can be made in the USA. It wasn't Obama who coined the phrase. Source: https://www.heraldtribune.com/...
My understanding is our banks are significantly more capitalized (they have more cash and cash equivalent assets) and less leveraged (they have less debt per dollar) than in the last crash. If true, those are significant fixes to the major contributors to the 2007 financial crisis. What data are you looking at?
Does Singapore even qualify? It’s a tax haven city state.
It is the democrats fault for drinking the horrible koolaid of the fringe far left with their "privilege plus power" crap and getting the establishment terminator shaped like a old women to run.
If they purge those things from their side, they will annihilate trump in 2020.
This is what happens when you put a true entrapeneur, ...
How does it go with the $779 bln budged deficit in 2018 - being competitive does not exclude being broke.
Other than cutting taxes and reducing regulation.
You are a complete idiot. Thanks for letting us clearly know that not only do you not know what you are talking about, but that you are willing to repeat obvious lies that you are too stupid to even realize are lies.
Remarkably little? As a Canadian I'm a little miffed at that, as Trump has taken away a massive amount of our foreign investment with his reduction of taxes and regulations. To be fair, he's had Trudeau on our side increasing taxes and regulations which has exacerbated Trump's successes, but the data is quite clear. (Examples here and here).
You might think these are just economist talking points but they have significant effect on economic growth and quality of life for each country, and Trump is clearly winning here.
That's a very hard argument to make, since it's correct a president does have limited control and more in the long-term effects. People will still blame the other side; eg. if we had a recession and the economy contracted by 2%, supporters will argue it would have been 4% or greater were it not for the actions of $Party_I_Support.
The Economy was rebounding under Obama due to the cyclical nature of the economy. There's nothing he could of done save launching the entire nuclear arsenal at his own citizens to stop this upturn.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Remarkably little? As a Canadian I'm a little miffed at that, as Trump has taken away a massive amount of our foreign investment with his reduction of taxes and regulations.
Outside of oil, the data says otherwise:
Fears of a mass investment exodus from Canada in the face of trade uncertainty and U.S. tax reforms aren’t materializing.
* https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-29/canada-2nd-qtr-foreign-direct-investment-drops-on-energy-exodus
The NPCs on slashdot will be using the same dialog trees until the site shuts down.
Or does it hurt too fucking much that Obama's 8 years of "remaking the US economy (based on dated, stale, and failed 19th century "progressive" redistributionist ideals...)" didn't work?
Trump is benefiting from Obama's economy -- it's not like the economy did a 180 when Trump was elected. We're currently in the longest bull market in US history, starting in 2009. The bull market that Trump derided as being a fraud when he was on the campaign trail, then took credit for when it was convenient for him.
I thought the economy was going to collapse under Trump? That was the libtard prediction pre election.
It's probably going to happen, and sooner rather than later. But really, the economic rise didn't have that much to do with the Obama, and there's very little that Trump will be able to do to stave off the eventual fall. Economies rise and fall, and the effect that the President has on them is greatly exaggerated.
If the US economy continues to grow without a substantial recession for the next 6 years, it will be in spite of Trump, not because of him. His war on trade has already caused serious, lasting harm to the US economy (short version: international trade relationships require that both companies and foreign countries can trust US behavior, but Trump's behavior is wildly erratic and unpredictable, meaning that the end result will likely be a large drop in US imports and exports, with the overall US trade deficit worsening and US citizens ending up poorer).
Additionally, the Republican party has been waging a broad campaign to eliminate the financial regulation which would have a chance of preventing or mitigating the next financial crash. Every year that economic exuberance prevails (which by my measure has been about 1-2 years so far: most of the growth during Obama's term was pretty muted and cautious) increases the likelihood that lots of money will be funneled into an unstable sector, as happened with housing around roughly 2003-2006. And without strong financial regulation, we have no protection against that.
My current thinking is that the probability of a recession within three years is quite high (whether or not the Republicans lose the House, Senate, or presidency in that time). If we get six years of solid growth without a drastic increase in financial regulation, I'll eat my hat.
Wow, this morning CDT the pro-Trump moderation was pretty positive. Then at some point the anti-Trump moderators swept through. Maybe during lunch time in California? I'd love to see a +/- moderation graph over time.
Apparently, you don't think America is renting machines that print money.
Apparently, you do think America is renting machines that spew giant piles of filth, that all has to be immediately carted off to the nearest landfill, at great expense.
Into which category goes a DVD? If it's a Gladiator DVD, soon enough it does go to the landfill, where it properly belongs (how did that abomination ever win Best Picture?)
However, if it's an instructional DVD titled "Machine Learning for Dummies"—though it might hasten to the landfill twice as fast—usually not until after the person consuming the DVD has absorbed the information and become an elite Machine Learning Ninja Turtle.
Advantage: America.
Moral of the story: Winners and losers in borrowed trade must be decided on a case by case basis. Because enlightened reinvestment is a win-win, any way you slice it.
This level of economic analysis requires 1/8 tablespoon more nuance than running around with your hair on fire chanting "derf derf deficit".
Wage growth is 1% account for inflation with the median weekly earnings up only 0.57% per year.
Plunged after the election? Are you blind or lying, that graph shows a nearly perfect linear decrease from 01/10 to 01/18; long before the election.
So GDP increased substantially but wage growth only beat inflation by 1%? And you think this is evidence against corporations reaping the benefits of the tax break without doing much for the rank and file why exactly?
DJIA/NASDAQ are up which is benefiting large investors, you're just making my point for me now.
You really want to argue that manufacturing is going to be anywhere near the levels it based on that growth? At the rate it grew it would take decades to reach where it was before the crash that started in 2000.
So let's see, your argument consisted of ignoring context, then lying, then listing 3 items that you didn't realize supported my complaint about the tax cuts, then made an argument that ignored absolute numbers, and to top it all off, insisted the facts actually supported your fantasy. Yup, that's a conservative argument. If you're already wealthy there's no doubt you're experiencing a great windfall in the Trump economy, but it's not trickling down this time either... shocker.
Obama had absolutely *NOTHING* to do with this. Just go back to say December and January before 45 took control. Predictions of gloom, doom. The economy was sure to tank. People would be on the street, etc.
Well they are on the street, where Democrats control the town like San Francisco, Portland, etc.
However the US is the strongest economy once again. If you want to keep the us going strong, vote for Republicans. If you want to be like Venezuela, vote for the Democrats. If you vote for the Dems, kiss your car, food, livelyhood goodbye because that's what's going to happen. Poverty for everyone.
That should help our productivity! :)
All kidding aside, the takeaway I get from looking at the Canadian numbers, is that the lowest scores that hurt our "productivity" are the "ICT Adoption", which is basically the number of subscriptions per capita of cellular and internet services. Which isn't a huge surprise when you look at how expensive and noncompetitive our telecommunication industry is (Rogers, Bell, and Telus) compared to the rest of the world. To which Canadian's have been complaining about for years. Perhaps it is time for government to take a look at what is causing our productivity index to fall and do something about it. The next time some conservative mentions corporate tax cuts to enhance productivity I'll be sure to point that out.
Your patoine and lumber industries are healthy!
Too bad you're too far north to grow really good pot outdoors. It's really hard to cover costs under lights, much less make a profit (at typical wholesale price in legal states).
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
The general consensus is that the economy takes a long time to change direction, and as such, any economic motion during the first year or two of any presidency is primarily due to momentum.
Or, to put it another way, we blamed the weak economy during Obama's first year or two on Bush. Why should Trump be held to a different standard just because the economy is going in a positive direction?
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That's not entirely true. The President nominates someone to head the Federal Reserve, which is a position that wields a lot of power over the economy. Fortunately, Trump seems to have accidentally nominated somebody who he doesn't really agree with, so we're okay there. :-D
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
The stock market is not the economy.
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It only takes 60 votes if there's some asshole willing to threaten to filibuster. Or some hero, depending on the issue.
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The economy was in bad shape when Bush left office because years earlier the Democrat-controlled Congress prevented financial reform that Bush wanted. (You can thank Barney Frank for that disaster.) The worst that can be honestly said of Bush is that he was a weak President who couldn't get around the opposition's obstructionism.
Obama's recovery merely got us back to where things were at their best under Bush, and it took 8 years to do that, because his policies retarded economic growth. That's not a good record; doing nothing would have been better.
Trump has actually advanced the economy to new ground, it's beyond recovery.
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Lots of working people have Individual Retirement Accounts that run through their employer. Those IRAs frequently invest in the stock market, in part or in whole. Last time I read any data, more than half of all households were invested in the stock market, either directly or through retirement accounts.
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