Charts of the Day: World Economic Forum survey on US competitiveness
Tuesday, September 21, 2010 at 12:01AM
Thomas P.M. Barnett in Chart of the day, US, global economy

Annual WEF "most competitive country ranking," where US now drops to fourth after Switzerland, Sweden and Singapore.

Of course, my usual counter is to say we're comparing a multinational state of 50 members to unitary states, so just as reasonable to see where those three stack up against our 50 individuals members as the other way around, but I quibble.

What's interesting is checking out the details, as in, when you see where we're still near the very top (innovation, labor market, business sophistication, higher education, infrastructure, technology--almost all in the private realm) versus where we've fallen lowest (public spending, public debt, national savings rate--more in the political realm).

So the question begs: What is really "broken" in America?  Capitalism or the political system?

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