US Competitiveness Lags a Bit

The US fell from First to sixth in a scare headline by the anti-American BBC, which just can't keep its editorials out of the straight news. The fact that the cum populations of the other five countries ahead of the US total around one-tenth of the US pop means the World Economic Forum has its own milestones and yardsticks. Germany and the UK fell slightly and Japan is just behind the US now.

More importantly, large economies such as China, Brazil and Russia fell rather farther down the list.

The US twin deficits are responsible, a worrisome aspect of the US's status as the still prevailing engine of world growth. Japan went into Carter-mode stagflation & double-digit interest ratesback in the '80s for two decades. If that happened to the US, stagflation would slow the entire world growth pattern for a good long while.