The Greatest Nation on Earth?

The US is a fine place, and I feel blessed to have the chance to spend time here. But one of strangest things about the US is the frequency its people describe the place as The Greatest Country on Earth. Let’s call it the GCE




It is everywhere. Patriotism is fine. People show flags and are proud of their nation. Adverts extol the nation. You expect that sort of thing from politicians and generals. But then this GCE expression sneaks in, in the least likely places. Half way through an NFL match, the commentator is moved to describe the USA as the GCE. Actually, on one recent occasion, he said the USA was still the GCE.



Don’t you love that “still”? There is some self-doubt creeping in, some fear of being in the process of being overtaken. Were the expression GCE to be any less ridiculous, the still would be a little sad. As it is, I love it.



For how would we possibly decide the GCE?



History and legacy? Well, how about Italy, Greece, Iraq or even Kenya? Longevity as a nation? I’ve no idea who the winners of that one are (Greece again maybe?) but for sure it isn’t the USA. Natural beauty? Many contenders there. Queens and Brooklyn are not among them.



Intelligence? That would nowadays be Finland, south Korea or Hong Kong. I am not sure who wins the most Nobel prizes per capita. Human development? Well, they live the longest in Japan, infant mortality is lowest in Scandinavia I think, and the healthcare system in the US is almost an extension of a bank, hardly a role model.



Who tries to lead the world to development? The millennial goals and the best UN initiatives often stem from Scandinavia, and Britain can be relatively proud too. Climate change? Norway, and indeed almost anyone but the USA.



Culture? Judging by how much the Americans defer to British culture, on that one not even they would claim a lead. There is Hollywood I suppose. Sport? Per head Australia is a leader, Brazil has the best record in the most popular sport, and many countries score more Olympic gold medals per head than the USA. At least they are the best in US Football (and the Superbowl winners are labelled world champions without irony)!



Everywhere you look in the USA you see grinding poverty and misery. Where is poverty lowest? Norway perhaps. And happiness? Bhutan claims that one, but several South-East Asian nations seem to have faces that only smile. Studies of child well-being I always find interesting, even though they tend to cover only developed nations. In those the Netherlands and Scandinavia win, while the USA and UK rank dead last.



Then there is wealth. Total GDP in the US is highest, but what does that actually mean? GDP per person is higher in Luxembourg and other small states. And increasingly the US is mired in debt, piles and piles of it, with so sign of any reduction. Many great companies come from the US, and the economy is known as innovative, but, per head, Finland would certainly beat it.



What about politics and freedom? Probably liberty and freedom are the words the GCE advocates would back up their claims with. Well, the politics is horrible, if the recent election is anything to go by, with money controlling everything and little attempt at a debate. As for liberty, maybe US passport holders do OK, but the rest of us have to stand in line quite a lot! Religious tolerance seems pretty limited, while social tolerance appears weak. How can a state with so many signs and instructions and caveats and lawsuits claim a lead in liberty? The medical adverts here are hilarious. And the US locks up more people per head than almost any nation on earth, and kills some, including children. Liberty?



There is one definition left. Military power. On that one there is no contest. Since the Bay of pigs it hasn’t actually led to many glorious victories, but for sure the US military might leaves the rest in its wake and enables a decisive voice in many conflicts, for good or ill.



So, when the commentator says GCE, he should really talk about the biggest power to bully others around. Judging by league tables, the true greatest nations might be Nordic ones, though part of their nature would mean they would never claim it – indeed the Swedes would hate the idea.



This is fun, and I should repeat I do love the place and its people. But what interests me is the effect of the continuous GCE claims. Does it do good or does it do harm?



Before that, some slightly related stories. First, in the US the festival of Christ the King is known as Christ the King of the Universe. Listening to that made me think of Superman or Flash Gordon. We wouldn’t try that in Europe. In the same service, we sang a patriotic American hymn to the tune of, wait for it, God Save the Queen. That made me feel slightly odd, though then I realised I’d been singing alternative words to the German national anthem since I was a child (but not patriotic ones).



Anyway, many Americans believe they are the GCE (still, ha ha), and there seems to be some informal campaign to perpetuate the belief. Annoying and amusing to foreigners for sure, but does the perception help the US? Or help the world?



On the plus side, it makes people walk taller, complain less (even in New York), and work better as a team. There is a feel good factor about the place. Strangely, this even seems to extend to immigrants, especially second and later generation ones. And it may even create a market for further immigrants, which allows the US to be selective and still let in productive ones. It creates some unifying values, even if in practice these are not always followed. All these things have some benefit. The nation seems more likely to hold together while it believes in itself.



But, even for the US, there are downsides too. The same factors diminish healthy challenge. Try raising gun laws here and hear the denial. The election campaign did not for an instant consider that there might be something to learn from other nations, only ugly false portrayal of China.



Arguably, hubris is what destroys all empires. They get lazy, they stop learning, they think they can do things that they can’t. The saddest tragic failure of the last twenty years might be the unshakeable belief in the USA that their troops would be welcomed with open arms into Baghdad. That has a real fin de siècle feel about it, as does the denial over economic reality, and the descent into complacent obesity. The Romans and even the British came to see themselves as infallible, and thus sowed the seeds of their own downfall.



To the world, the scorecard is even more weighted on the downside. Having a hegemon can have advantages, for example in leading efforts on something like climate change. But that hegemon has to be able to see beyond its borders occasionally. Arguably, US military might has prevented as many wars as it has caused, but the ones that have happened have become more intractable and damaging.



In that same Church service, we were asked to pray (twice) that the nations of the world should come to see Jesus as their saviour. That seems to cut across general modern beliefs about the separation of Church from State. But, more, the lazy statement seemed to me to epitomise a certainty of rightness, an unwillingness to consider that alternatives might be as good or at least can exist in harmony. True, this was Catholic Christianity talking not US politics, but I sensed that Catholic Christianity would not have been so lazy in a country without a GCE complex. Of course this is the sort of sentiment that ultimately can lead to crusades, intolerance, and war (and then decline of the one expressing the sentiment).



Sometimes I become ridiculously naïve. I argue that nations themselves are the things that hold back the world the most, and the time has come to challenge the whole concept. Fat chance. Now I am asking the USA to go easy on the GCE stuff. Dream on, Graham.

A Fair Start

Last Sunday I witnessed a crowd of over a thousand kids queuing around two blocks in New York City to take a test to qualify to get into some specialised schools. It was quite an event, marshalled by police and enough to stop the traffic, and the event was repeated in other venues up and down the city. The kids were as diverse as you could ever imagine, at least in their visible traits.




Part of me was impressed with this piece of Americana. Any kid is allowed to sit the test, and the result is judged only on merit, with places offered based on the test alone, no interview or background check. It also reminded me once again of the sheer scale of this huge city. I have spent a lot of the last months standing or observing lines like these ones.



The test is designed as much as possible to look for innate ability, but of course it cannot entirely do that for twelve-year-olds. Half were comprehension questions, logic puzzles and scrambled paragraphs (sentences you had to place in the right order). The rest were maths, with a premium on speed of working and stamina.



We had spent (their) time and (our) money mugging our kids up for this event, and here my mood darkens a bit. Is it really as fair as it makes out? Actually, the test is judging most of all how well prepared the child is. It is telling that, even though effort is made to avoid the use of concepts that require teaching, nonetheless the regular US curriculum does not include everything that is required. A kid showing up in class, doing moderately well, and then attending the test, would very likely not do well unless exceptionally bright.



But then a child who was able to supplement regular classes with some tailored tutoring stood a much greater chance, since a lot of the key to success was about familiarity with the type of questions and level of practice at working through them at speed. Now how fair is that? Kids blessed with a good postal address would have attended schools where teachers could train them a bit, but most not. And otherwise, the ones with the best chance were the ones with parents wealthy enough to invest in tutors, especially those doing so over many years.



So New York City have tried really hard to create a system that equalises opportunity, but actually may have made it worse. The cream (or the wealthy?) are skimmed off into specialist schools and some other honours courses that are screened on test scores, while the rest end up in zoned schools. Now let me guess which of these schools the better teachers wish to teach in? Which ones find space in the calendar for extra educational activities, rather than remedial ones?



There is also a potential cultural commentary here. The kids with the tutors and the parent-enforced study ethic from a young age are overwhelmingly Asian. This mirrors what little I know of Asian education in general: Singapore and Hong Kong top international league tables, while South Korea is infamous for the young age that all kids start competing for places in elite institutions. India’s elite colleges create similar pressure there. Viewing the faces in that two block line in Long island City, one could be forgiven for mistaking the location as somewhere in Asia.



New York City does its best. In principle any kid can apply for any school. Schools are forced to provide statistics on graduation and college entry. They also provide a more scary statistic, that of ethnic mix, which provides a horrible proxy for attainment. When researching where to live in New York, we used a book of school statistics as a guide. I can’t say I’m proud of that, but as a parent there is only so much space for altruism. The overall outcome must work to entrench success and failure to locality.



One interesting outcome in New York is the huge range of attainment. Our kids are in a school with ten classes in their age grade (yes, it is a large school, large like everything in this city). The classes are streamed. The teachers work from a standard curriculum, including standard homework assignments. I have the uneasy feeling that the top classes already know most of what is taught and require extra stimulus, while the assignments for bottom classes are way out of their depth. Compared with Europe or Asia, I suspect the range of attainment within a school is far greater.



So the end result is entrenched inequality. And that is without even mentioning the poison (for equality of opportunity) of private, fee paying schools. Your parent’s wealth and lifestyle determine your address and your opportunity, probably more than any other factor. Many countries have attempted many schemes, but, as New York shows, the unintended consequences can outweigh the benefits. Some have managed to drag up the average attainment, but few have truly addressed the equality of opportunity issue. And what may look like higher attainment, for example in South Korea, might only be achieved at terrible cost to social development and the opportunity for kids to enjoy just being kids.



So what is to be done? Usually in this blog I have ideas I believe in, but in this case I am somewhat lost. At the heart of the question is the role of parents. All parents want the best for their kids. Getting them the best education possible is a big priority. And the most successful parents have the greatest ability to achieve their goal. Is that wrong? One can hardly object to the aspiration – that sounds like communism or worse. And by the way it will never win votes. And, oh yes, every historical attempt to take away the opportunity has led to a collapse in standards for all.



So we are left with schemes to make the playing field slightly less sloped but still far from level. Bussing. Lotteries. General tests. Quotas. All have flaws, but before we reject them, we have to reflect on the problem they are trying to address and the lack of good alternatives.



Two other policies must make sense, one for each end of the spectrum.



If money is allowed to create opportunity for kids, let us make sure we tax it heavily or at least fairly. The continued charitable status of British public (private) schools feels to me an example of the 1% taking the piss of the rest. I was a beneficiary, and my Mum could reasonably argue that she sacrificed a lot to give me the opportunity, but this sort of argument cannot trump the general one about equalising opportunity. You also can’t argue with Tony Blair and other politicians sending their own kids to public schools. You can argue if they act to perpetuate the unfair advantages of the system. Another obvious sore is the alumni advantage offered by some US colleges. That is entrenched privilege at its most ugly.



The other policy must be to focus at the bottom end to lift the opportunity for the disadvantaged. Extra incentives to teach in deprived areas, and extra budgets for schools there to face up to their extra problems. And schemes to incentivise parents to at least get their kids into school (Brazil is the role model, but such ideas have a place in the developed world too).



I think that is a fair balance. We cling onto the benefits that our own wealth gives us to give our kids a leg up, even though that wealth is probably driven largely by the leg up our own parents gave us. But in return we are ready to pay some tax to help those deprived of such opportunities as much as possible.



The test results for New York City come out in February. Wish us luck.

Letting the GINI out of the bottle

I found The Economist report on inequality during October as one of its best pieces of work for a long time. True to form, it dissected the issue without sentimentality or bias, then proscribed workable remedies.




I have started to notice a trend in the Euro crisis. The Economist does some quality analysis. Some weeks later a consensus emerges among leaders in support of the analysis. Finally, something gets implemented. The last part is always a watered down version, constrained as it is by politics. But I see my favourite magazine starting to have a real impact on outcomes. And I like that.



First, it is refreshing to see The Economist tackling inequality in such depth. As a free market paper, it would be easy to assume that it would be quite hard-hearted about the consequence of capitalism. The Guardian whines on about inequality week after week, as you would expect from a more liberal publication. But the Guardian never comes up with sensible solutions, only hand-wringing and business bashing.



So perhaps the best part of the survey was how The Economist justified the need for concern about inequality. It highlighted the inefficiencies of entrenched inequality. Essentially, the rich succeed in putting up walls to keep out the poor, be it in voice, or education, or in protecting monopolies. That in itself constrains total opportunity for the next generation, as precious resources are wasted and many of the most talented cannot make their talent count, while journeymen can wield power without sufficient checks and balances. Then there is the risk of embitterment and social unrest.



This has always been the case, and those of us blessed by the circumstances of our birth should keep reminding ourselves. As a male born in 1960 in the richest end of an English speaking G7 country to well-off parents, I should be careful how good I allow myself to feel about anything I might have achieved.



The survey gives credence to the impression that the inequality trends in the world are currently bad, just like the period at the end of the 19th century (which, by the way, led to some horrific wars). Despite success with the millennium goals, the GINI coefficient and an index of social mobility are rapidly heading south, almost everywhere.



Now, two weeks ago I listened to a Gospel about how rich people had next to no chance of entering the kingdom of heaven, whatever that may be, and should give away all they own. When I listen to that, I wonder how commentators can claim that the natural party of the Catholic Church in the US is the Republicans. But a great thing about the Economist survey is that it gives reason for concern about rising inequality even if we don’t read too many Gospels.



The Economist offered three global solutions, defined in admirable depth.



The first, true to form, was about free markets. Stop cosseting banks and interest groups. Tackle corruption with transparency and technology. Break up monopolies, even in services and in things like education. Unleash the full economic power of women, the old and the young. Let the market do its work. This recipe is required, with different blend of ingredients, in the developed and developing worlds.



The second redirects social spending to where it is needed and does good. Shift from the old to the young, from welfare to education, from the rich to the poor. Brazil is highlighted as a great recent role model, for its scheme of incentives for people to invest in their own education. Universal granny bus passes and fuel subsidies must go.



The third, and least important, leg is taxation. Don’t overtax high incomes, but do make capital tax closer than income tax and remove loopholes for the wealthy like mortgage relief, while taxing property. I loved the idea that inheritance tax should fall on recipients not the estate.



The theme of education comes up again and again. I am currently learning about the US education system from the inside. It is interesting, and far from all bad, but it is so clear how the outcome entrenches inequality of opportunity. I’ll blog more about that next time.



Now all of this is doable, and doable now. I believe it is also sellable. When I listen to the political ads on US TV I despair, as they run completely counter to this agenda. In the obituary of George McGovern I read again his 1972 manifesto, which had strong elements but massive naivety and was killed by interest groups. Perhaps my own proposal of doing away with countries has a touch of impracticality about it as well!



But maybe there is hope on inequality. If I am right, the European elite has started to read and react to the Economist. I suspect the Chinese elite are more humble than most and digest these things too. The US elite I am not so sure, but perhaps someone will. The millennium goals were the last time global leaders managed to think bigger than their next vote. The Economist inequality agenda deserves the same focus.