Time to Start Thinking: America in the Age of Descent
Luce, Washington bureau chief of the Financial Times, joins a lengthening parade of pundits—among them, Fareed Zakaria, Thomas L. Friedman, Tom Brokaw, and Bill Clinton—describing, in painfully graphic detail, America’s decline. Luce focuses on the seismic shift of money and talent from America’s technology sector to those of China, India, and beyond, a shift that has reverberated throughout the U.S. economy, particularly for the middle class. He attributes the change to, among other things, Republican demagoguery against federal funding of research, red tape in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, a polarized and paralyzed electorate, and the influence of big money on national politics. Unlike his fellow pundits, Luce doesn’t offer much in the way of solutions in this fine analysis, except maybe in this quote from one American entrepreneur, “To overcome a problem, you must first recognize it exists.” --Alan Moores