LONG LIVE AMERICAN DREAM by Shikha Dalmia brought to you by Ivo D’Souza

Goans should read this article thoroughly and see if it implicates Goa in comparison

Americans, hit first by outsourcing and then a recession, are becoming deeply pessimistic about their country’s ability to maintain its economic leadership in a globalized world. America’s Aristophanes, Jon Stewart, commented during a recent interview with Anand Giridhardas, author of India Calling: “The American dream is still alive—it’s just alive in India.

” Likewise, 20 percent Americans in a December National Journal poll believed that the U.S. economy was no longer the strongest. Nearly half picked China instead.  But there are at least five reasons why neither India nor China will knock America off its economic perch any time soon, at least not by the only measure that matters: Offering the best life to the most people.

America Wastes No Talent

Conventional wisdom holds that America’s global competitiveness is driven by geniuses flocking to its shore and producing breathtaking inventions. But America’s real genius lies not in tapping genius—but every scrap of talent up-and-down the scale.

A 2005 World Bank study found that the bulk of a people’s wealth comes not from tangible capital like raw resources and infrastructure. It comes from intangible wealth: effective government, secure property rights, a functioning judiciary. Such intangible factors put the equivalent of $418,000 at the disposal of every American resident. India and China? $3,738 and $4,208 respectively.

America’s vast intangible wealth makes everyone more productive and successful. Personal attributes—talent, looks, smarts—matter only on the margins. Having witnessed the life trajectory of many Indian immigrants, what’s striking to me is that, with some exceptions, it doesn’t matter whether they are the best in their profession in India or just mediocre. Within 10 to 15 years of arriving, they land in a very similar space. They get good jobs, buy homes, have children, send them to decent schools and colleges and save for their retirement. The differences in their standard of living would have been far greater had they stayed home.

America Does Not Have India’s Infrastructure Deficit or China’s Civil Society Deficit

India’s gap with America extends not just to intangible capital but tangible capital as well. Basic facilities in India—roads, water, sewage—remain primitive. For example, a 2010 McKinsey Global Institute report found that India treats 30 percent of raw sewage, whereas the international norm is 100 percent. India provides 105 liters of water per person per day, the minimum standard is 150 liters. It needs to spend twice the slated expenditures over the next 10 years to deliver basic services.

China, meanwhile, has a major civil society problem. America has made about $100 trillion in Social Security and Medicare promises to seniors that it can’t fund. But American seniors face nothing like the kind of destitution that the Chinese do. China’s one-child policy has decimated the natural safety net that old people rely on in traditional societies. And China offers no public safety net to the vast majority of village-born. Worse, many Chinese have invested their nest eggs is various asset bubbles that will wipe out their only means of subsistence if they burst, making the Great Depression look like a beach party.  America Does Not Have Grinding Poverty