UncategorizedUS & World

US Economic Freedom Slips Further

We’ve never been sold on The Heritage Foundation like some “conservatives” are, but the think tank’s “Index of Economic Freedom” is a worthwhile project. Released each year in conjunction with The Wall Street Journal, the index assesses how 186 nations perform on ten key metrics – ranging from property rights…

We’ve never been sold on The Heritage Foundation like some “conservatives” are, but the think tank’s “Index of Economic Freedom” is a worthwhile project.

Released each year in conjunction with The Wall Street Journal, the index assesses how 186 nations perform on ten key metrics – ranging from property rights to the rule of law to tax rates to entrepreneurship.

According to the latest data, the United States scored a 75.5 on the index – down half a point from 2013.  This drop was “primarily due to deteriorations in property rights, fiscal freedom, and business freedom.”

That puts America in the “mostly free,” category … which is something worth remembering whenever you hear this country referred to as the “land of the free.”

“Over the 20-year history of the Index, the U.S.’s economic freedom has fluctuated significantly,” Heritage notes. “During the first 10 years, its score rose gradually, and it joined the ranks of the economically “free” in 2006. Since then, it has suffered a dramatic decline of almost 6 points, with particularly large losses in property rights, freedom from corruption, and control of government spending. The U.S. is the only country to have recorded a loss of economic freedom each of the past seven years. The overall U.S. score decline from 1995 to 2014 is 1.2 points, the fourth worst drop among advanced economies.”

Disappointing … although we’re surprised the deterioration isn’t worse.

ECONOMIC FREEDOM INDEX (U.S. PAGE)

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22 comments

GrandTango January 15, 2014 at 3:03 pm

Duuuuhhhhh…Obama’s president…what’d you expect….

Reply
Black Eyed Susan January 15, 2014 at 3:45 pm

A dull clichéd response from Grand Tango…that’s what we expect.

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GrandTango January 15, 2014 at 5:03 pm

Some cliches become that, because they are true…that is the case here…

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CorruptionInColumbia January 15, 2014 at 3:09 pm

Speaking of finances going down the toilet, more crappy news from Wells Fargo:

http://www.stevequayle.com/index.php?s=604

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CNSYD January 15, 2014 at 3:18 pm

Looking over the list of the 11 countries ahead of the US, which one do you wish to move to? Ireland? Home of the IRA and Sinn Finn. Chile?, Canada? They love English speakers in Quebec.

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Sandpit Blues January 15, 2014 at 3:50 pm

Looks like anywhere but South Carolina to me. If we pulled SC out of the U.S. hell, we might make it in the top ten.

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CNSYD January 15, 2014 at 3:55 pm

I 20, I 95, I 85, I 26, I 77. Pick one and you will be free at last.

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Sandpit Blues January 15, 2014 at 3:59 pm

I 77 to I 26! Free at last, free at last! Better yet: Free from last, free from last!

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The Colonel January 17, 2014 at 5:34 am

Delta’s ready when you are brother.

Smirks January 15, 2014 at 3:26 pm

Question: Out of the Top Ten, which country does -not- have universal health care?

1) Hong Kong
2) Singapore
3) Australia
4) Switzerland
5) New Zealand
6) Canada
7) Chile
8) Mauritius
9) Ireland
10) Denmark

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GrandTango January 15, 2014 at 5:05 pm

Wow…cannot wait to CATCH UP to those @$$-Backwards armpits, who’d be eating $#!*, and sucking @$$#$, if it were not for the US beating the $#!* out of the Communists and A-holes you, and Obama, suck off….

There’s a reason we’re the most successful country in the history of the world, that freed slaves from the democrat slave-holders and liberated the Jews from Socialist Nazis…

And it looks like we;’re going to have to beat the $#!* out of internal American hating, Terrorist pieces of $#!*, like you and Obama…

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Table Tennis January 15, 2014 at 5:30 pm

The most sucessful country in the history of the world? Hit it and pass it, BigT. Sounds like some some shit yer smoking!

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GrandTango January 15, 2014 at 7:46 pm

Yeah, Dumb@$$…Reagan beat the F*#k out of the USSR, because Communism is as fraudulent as Obama…I’m sure that breaks your heart…and shatters your myths…

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Table Tennis January 15, 2014 at 7:53 pm

You are aware the history of the world didn’t start in the 20th Century, right??

John Boy January 15, 2014 at 5:40 pm

Hahaha!! Someone’s in a mood. What’s wrong buddy? Was the Piggly Wiggly out of Jimmy Dean?

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SC Dem January 15, 2014 at 7:36 pm

Republicans opposed the war with Hitler. Democrats freed the Jews, and Democrats pushed through the voting rights act, that Republicans just successfully gutted..

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Really? January 15, 2014 at 8:44 pm

So having universal health care is going to get us back in the top 10?

LMAO!

Let me guess what piece of genius is next- Wet sidewalks cause rain?

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Tom January 16, 2014 at 7:49 pm

Universal health care and quality public education would be a great start.

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The Colonel January 17, 2014 at 5:33 am

What are these the “top ten” of?

Ireland is certianly not a economic powerhouse anymore, the “Celtic Tiger” is and has been dead for years. They have a fairly high GDP per capita becuase of the small population and tremendous tourism industry.

Australia won’t appear in any economic powerhouse list either (Austria would though)

Mauritius – another “powerful nation” of 1.2 million whose economy is largely tourism based. The reason their GDP per capita is so high is becasue of the “off shore” banking industry – (read tax shelter and hidden accounts)

Hong King’s “universal health care”?!? “…“If I can afford the medical costs of my wife giving birth in Hong Kong, why not?” asked a 38-year-old building designer from Shenzhen who would give only his surname, Yue. He said he paid about 80,000 Hong Kong dollars (more than $10,000) so that his first child, a boy, would be born in the city…” http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/23/world/asia/mainland-chinese-flock-to-hong-kong-to-have-babies.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

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Jessica 981 January 15, 2014 at 9:32 pm

Not surprising, considering the last thing Obama and the robots who support him want is economic freedom. They would nationalize candy stores if they could get away with it.

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Thomas January 16, 2014 at 8:26 am

@ Karl Smarx-ass

Dig a little deeper on your “universal healthcare” brain dead ejaculation. Try digging up stats on quality of care, availability of doctors, hospitals, research hospitals, ambulances, EMS, infant mortality rates, access to MRI scanners etc. We will never see those numbers from the hard left parroting wackos who haunt chat rooms….unless Smarx is a Fits troll paid to stir up angst to get clicks with his ridiculous bull shit there is no way anyone who is literate can possibly want to argue that stupid post. Come on people, wtf?

Do not feed the trolls

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9" January 16, 2014 at 10:26 pm

“Something is profoundly wrong with the way we live today. For thirty years we have made a virtue out of the pursuit of material self-interest: indeed this very pursuit now constitutes whatever remains of our sense of collective purpose. We know what things cost but have no idea what they are worth. We no longer ask of a judicial ruling or a legislative act: Is it good Is it fair Is it just Is it right Will it help bring about a better society or a better world Those used to be the political questions even if they invited no easy answers. We must learn once again to pose them.

The materialistic and selfish quality of contemporary life is not inherent in the human condition. Much of what appears “natural” today dates from the 1980s: the obsession with wealth creation the cult of privatization and the private sector the growing disparities of rich and poor. And above all the rhetoric that accompanies these: uncritical admiration for unfettered markets disdain for the public sector the delusion of endless growth.

We cannot go on living like this. The little crash of 2008 was a reminder that unregulated capitalism is its own worst enemy: sooner or later it must fall prey to its own excesses and turn again to the state for rescue. But if we do no more than pick up the pieces and carry on as before we can look forward to greater upheavals in years to come.”
? Tony Judt, Ill Fares the Land

Reply

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