This article by Deirde McCloskey presents an overview of how the US accrued its wealth, but there are certainly elements of opinion and authorial bias. This is likely to be, in part, due to the fact that McCloskey has also recently published a book, Bourgeois Ethics, on the topic of wealth in the Western world, whose ideas this article promotes.
1. According to McCloskey, it is not really the case that exploitation of workers...
This article by Deirde McCloskey presents an overview of how the US accrued its wealth, but there are certainly elements of opinion and authorial bias. This is likely to be, in part, due to the fact that McCloskey has also recently published a book, Bourgeois Ethics, on the topic of wealth in the Western world, whose ideas this article promotes.
1. According to McCloskey, it is not really the case that exploitation of workers has generated the existing wealth in the US, despite what some have said. Nor does she believe that savings can have led to the existing wealth, or institutions "for routinely accumulating it." While she believes capital and a strong legal system were important for the fiscal growth of America, she feels the most important contributor to America's wealth was "betterment"—the fact that people in the US have been encouraged to have ideas and to turn these ideas into money-making ventures. Essentially, according to McCloskey, "the coupling of ideas in the heads of the common people yielded an explosion of betterments." Now, this is McCloskey's personal view. You could equally argue that the other possible elements she cites (exploitation, savings, strong legal systems, institutions) have had more sway over the US accumulation of wealth. Do you feel that her argument is a strong one? Could the US have become equally wealthy without its culture of innovation?
2. The second question—"Do you believe your children will be better off than you are?"—is difficult for someone else to answer for you. This question asks for your personal opinion on the matter. It has, for the past few generations, generally been believed that children will necessarily be better off than their parents, but several recent studies have suggested that this may no longer be the case. Recent reports have indicated that millennials (born between 1982 and 2004) are 16% less likely to own their own home than their parents. And those parents, in turn, are 10% less likely to own a home than their own "baby boomer" parents. I have attached an article on the subject below. So, do you feel optimistic about the next generation, or has the dream of upward mobility been killed by a succession of economic crises?
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