# A debate on where America was before Trump. Were we really in decline? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 22, 2020, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648 "2020-12-22T14:56:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 16
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/301 "2021-01-07T17:08:23Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > In the US at least, many people go bankrupt due to health issues. Your insurance comes from your job; if you lose your job due to a medical issue you also lose your insurance. > > Beyond that, I don’t think a modern nation as wealthy as we are should have any homelessness. That’s an issue of political will, not economics. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/302 "2021-01-07T17:08:33Z")
It is true that expenses associated with this particular plague are paid for by the government. But for smaller scale disease outbreaks or other medical issues (cancer, heart disease, etc) the US will happily allow you to bankrupt yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/303 "2021-01-07T17:10:54Z")
I didn’t say it was. From a purely economic point of view, if we could educate and train 7 billion people to be productive members of first world societies, then worldwide production would soar and everyone’s standard of living would increase - the same way we live better than medieval kings, in many ways, without requiring a huge underclass of peasants. We can feed everyone on Earth, from an economic perspective, and we’d all be better off if we did. Political will is the only thing standing in our way. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/304 "2021-01-07T17:12:26Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > Now of course, many people would scoff at this, and point out how automation has increased and yet there are lots of people in the US that are unemployed and/or below the poverty line. > But this is not because there are not millions of jobs available, but rather because of various market failures like 1) not enough people trained in areas that are in demand, 2) opportunities not being given to certain groups (e.g. a 50-year old guy that could make a fantastic junior clerk but will never be offered that role) and yes 3) some proportion of people with drug or alcohol problems that would need to be treated first. Hmmm. Are there really so many jobs unfilled? And what about the ‘extra’ unemployed that Trump pointed out before his election (one of his few useful points) and promptly forgot about once he was in charge? ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/305 "2021-01-07T17:14:49Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > I didn’t say it was. From a purely economic point of view, if we could educate and train 7 billion people to be productive members of first world societies, then worldwide production would soar and everyone’s standard of living would increase - the same way we live better than medieval kings, in many ways, without requiring a huge underclass of peasants. Wouldn’t it take something like 7 Earths for all people to live to American standards? Or is that just a myth? ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/306 "2021-01-07T17:29:35Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > Wouldn’t it take something like 7 Earths for all people to live to American standards? Or is that just a myth? It might take 7 Earths for everyone to live at an American standard of living using our current and extremely inefficient production techniques, but that’s because it’s much cheaper (as an initial investment) to, for example, cover Iowa in corn fields (or burn down the Amazon for farmland) instead of growing food in the sort of industrial greenhouses you see covering Southern Spain, or the Negev in Israel. Such greenhouse produce many times more food than a farm of the same size, and vertical farming is many times more efficient than greenhouses. So can everyone in the world enjoy the amount of beef that Americans currently do using free-range cows, or even cows fed on corn grown in Iowa? Probably not, at least not without destroying the tiny little bits of wilderness we still have on this planet. But can everyone enjoy a first-world standard of living? Absolutely, and people peddling the opposite view are usually doing so because it creates an us vs them incentive. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/307 "2021-01-07T17:31:53Z")
And by the way, the initial investment for farming a few hundred acres of Iowa might be cheaper than building a greenhouse complex or vertical farm, but as our tech gets better and more advanced farming methods get cheaper, and land becomes more and more scarce, that equation is changing. I don’t think greenhouses and vertical farms will beat traditional fields because we want to feed the world - they will beat traditional fields once they economically outcompete them, a development we are on the verge of. Especially because these sorts of farms are easier to automate, and as automating becomes more attractive, so will these new methods of farming. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/308 "2021-01-07T17:38:34Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > Wouldn’t it take something like 7 Earths for all people to live to American standards? If you define “American standards” as current levels of American fossil-fuel consumption, grazing and deforestation requirements, greenhouse-gas emissions, etc., then the estimate is [about 4 to 5 Earths](https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33133712). But comfortable living standards, even at the modern-developed-nation level, don’t have to require that much overconsumption and pollution and excess environmental footprint. The above link shows, for example, that the planetary requirements would be nearly cut in half if the whole population lived to French standards rather than American ones—and I don’t think one could really argue that the French are significantly economically or socially deprived compared to Americans. And there’s a whole host of sustainability practices and emerging technologies that could reduce developed-nation environmental footprints to levels significantly below even the French one. There’s no intrinsic reason that modern humans can’t have both nearly universal comfortable living standards and a sustainable environmental footprint. It will take a lot of work and planning if it can ever be achieved, of course. Mostly, and most challengingly, it will take the political will to prioritize general prosperity higher than the continuing disproportionate enrichment of those who profit the most from the present system. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/309 "2021-01-07T18:14:11Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > Hmmm. Are there really so many jobs unfilled? Yes 7.6 million [according to the US department of labor](https://www.jpmorgan.com/commercial-banking/insights/why-us-has-millions-of-unfilled-jobs#:~:text=While%20the%20skills%20gap%20may,their%20greatest%20challenges%20this%20year.). Granted this was immediately prior to Covid, but I don’t think it would be fair to measure changes to the way we work based on the very unusual last few months. I suspect this actually understates the skills gap, but I can’t find data on how exactly they arrived at 7.6m. But regardless, it was higher than the number of job seekers for the same period. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2021, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/310 "2021-01-07T18:23:32Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > If you define “American standards” as current levels of American fossil-fuel consumption, grazing and deforestation requirements, greenhouse-gas emissions, etc., then the estimate is [about 4 to 5 Earths](https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33133712). Grow food in greenhouses or vertical farms and that solves the deforestation problem; lower meat consumption to European levels or switch to lab meat to solve the grazing requirement; and switch to renewables to solve the fossil fuel issue. These are all changes that WILL happen in the relatively near future no matter what we do, because they are right on the verge of being economically cheaper than the alternative. In the meantime, our current methods are slightly cheaper to the producer, so they are preferred. But this is the Tragedy of the Commons - the extraneous cost to everyone on Earth is huge (global warming, the destruction of the biosphere, and one of the worst mass extinctions the world has ever known). An intelligent and rational species would act NOW to use regulations to apply this cost to the producer, incentivizing them to transfer over to the sustainable (and long term superior) methods now, before more damage is done. What we most likely WILL do is push our planet to the very brink. ---
**Author:** ![Jay\_Z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Jay\_Z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jay_Z)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/311 "2021-01-08T17:42:36Z")
One of the problems with all of the idle time is people like Trump and his followers. Trump isn’t George Washington or even Rockefeller. He self promotes and incites but basically has no other skills or interests. That was enough to get him elected president. Most of the Trumpkins in Washington on January 6th were elite people, people who are doing well. They just spend all of their time reading propaganda and believing Trump. I suppose in the long run this will open up more jobs in the Deep State to stamp out this sort of destruction. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/312 "2021-01-08T18:12:28Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > but as our tech gets better and more advanced farming methods get cheaper, and land becomes more and more scarce, that equation is changing. I suspect that arable land is not, on average, the limiting factor to global “American standards”, but rather access to electricity and process heat and the various capital and resource inputs that go into their production. My recollection is that agricultural productivity has increased faster than population growth, such that land use for agriculture has flattened globally and is decreasing in the US. But I haven’t checked recently, so holler if that smells and I can poke around. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/313 "2021-01-08T18:24:12Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > And what about the ‘extra’ unemployed that Trump pointed out before his election (one of his few useful points) and promptly forgot about once he was in charge? It wasn’t ever entirely clear to me what he was talking about there. Maybe U-6 unemployment. Maybe workforce participation. The former was decreasing when he was elected and continued to do so until 2020. The latter (for “core age” so as to avoid counting retirees) was down 3 points from peak but increasing then and on until 2020. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/314 "2021-01-08T18:56:56Z")
I mean, eyeballing this chart here, it _may_ have gone up .5% since Trump was re-elected? Until, you know, he remained President for too long… [![Imgur](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50813899593_ef5f625880_b.jpg "2021-01-08\_12-55-05") ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/68782016@N08/50813899593/) ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/315 "2021-01-08T19:05:53Z")
> [@Ruken](#): > > It wasn’t ever entirely clear to me what he was talking about there. Maybe U-6 unemployment. Maybe workforce participation. The former was decreasing when he was elected and continued to do so until 2020. The latter (for “core age” so as to avoid counting retirees) was down 3 points from peak but increasing then and on until 2020. Workforce participation IIRC. I recall seeing some kind of fact check about it way back in 2016 saying Trump actually had a point on this claim. That unemployment figures only count people actively looking for work and not those who have given up and are eg living off disability benefits or supported by family members, and that the latter had increased after 2008 and not recovered. But after he was elected it all went down the memory hole and he only talked about the standard unemployment rate, just like Obama had. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/316 "2021-01-08T19:13:58Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > I mean, eyeballing this chart here, it _may_ have gone up .5% since Trump was re-elected? Until, you know, he remained President for too long… That one includes the rapidly retiring boomer population. Which is why I mentioned the core age participation. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2021, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/317 "2021-01-08T19:20:41Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > That unemployment figures only count people actively looking for work and not those who have given up and are eg living off disability benefits or supported by family members, and that the latter had increased after 2008 and not recovered. U-6 includes: Discouraged workers All other persons marginally attached to the labor force Employed part time for economic reasons. BLS A-15 shows all six official unemployment numbers. I think you fall off of U-6 after a year, as opposed to a month for “the” unemployment rate (U-3). So there will be some people not counted there. ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2021, 2:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/318 "2021-10-09T02:45:35Z")
Additional charts to consider: U.S. middle class decreasing share of wealth since 1989: > Increasing debt as a percentage of GDP since 1981: > Related: global inequality, with a minority owning more wealth than the bottom half of the world population. > ---
**Author:** ![ralfy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ralfy/32/600_2.png) [@ralfy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralfy)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2021, 2:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/319 "2021-10-09T02:54:12Z")
U.S. GDP growth per annum has been on a downward trend since 1961: > **[GDP growth (annual %) | Data](https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG)** > > GDP growth (annual %) from The World Bank: Data U.S. net trade in goods and services has been on a downward trend since 1971: > **[Net trade in goods and services (BoP, current US$) - United States | Data](https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/BN.GSR.GNFS.CD?locations=US)** > > Net trade in goods and services (BoP, current US$) - United States from The World Bank: Data U.S. total debt has been increasing since 1957, but started rising significantly during the 1980s, with an increasing gap between that and national income: > **[America's Total Debt Report - summary page - by MWHodges](https://grandfather-economic-report.com/debt-nat.htm)** > > America's total debt approaching $60 Trillion, including the highest peacetime ratio. I am concered for the economic future of our youth compared to prior generations. Finally, besides that unfunded liabilities might be as high as $210 trillion: > **[Your Pension Is a Lie: There's $210 Trillion Of Liabilities Our Government...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnmauldin/2017/10/10/your-pension-is-a-lie-theres-210-trillion-of-liabilities-our-government-cant-fulfill/)** > > Again, to make this clear: Your Social Security benefits are guaranteed under current law, but Congress reserves the right to change the law. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2021, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648/320 "2021-10-28T12:52:56Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > There’s no intrinsic reason that modern humans can’t have both nearly universal comfortable living standards and a sustainable environmental footprint. It will take a lot of work and planning if it can ever be achieved, of course. Mostly, and most challengingly, it will take the political will to prioritize general prosperity higher than the continuing disproportionate enrichment of those who profit the most from the present system. Sure there is. It requires a lot of work and planning and political will. Things people suck at. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-debate-on-where-america-was-before-trump-were-we-really-in-decline/928648.md?page=15)