Will We Be Richer Than Our Kids?

Monday, December 27th, 2004

From Will We Be Richer Than Our Kids? :

Throughout our history, children have lived better than their parents, usually by a wide margin. The math is simple. The U.S. economy, despite occasional dips, has grown consistently at 3 percent a year or more. So, at age 48, you will be four times richer than the average American when you were born.

James K. Glassman dismisses the weak dollar and our trade deficit and points to these three threats to American growth:

  • We’re developing a science gap.

  • We’re discouraging what economist John Maynard Keynes called “animal spirits” — the drive to take business and investing risks that ultimately benefit others as well as ourselves.
  • We won’t have enough workers to provide the Social Security and Medicare benefits for retired Americans.

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