Government: Looking Into the Future to Prevent it From Happening
Fantastic Progress
We ended last week wondering what had gone wrong: How come the 21st century has turned out to be such a dud?
Where are the jaw-dropping new inventions? Where are the rising incomes? Where is the dynamic, sizzling economy we expected?
Back in about 1963, we recall trying to picture ourselves in the 21st century. The rate of progress then was so fantastic we had to stretch to imagine it.
Every year, Chevrolet, Ford and Chrysler put out a new and better automobile. In 50 more years, surely cars would be regularly flying through the air!
In 1969, Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. It was just a matter of time before we had a colony there… from which we could explore the solar system.
Then in 1970, the pocket electronic calculator appeared. Half a century later, imagine the condensed knowledge and computing power we would be able to carry around.
Aging Economies
The only one of those things that realized its apparent potential was the increase in computing power. That has changed life on planet Earth. Now, instead of talking to your neighbors in the elevator, you can keep your head down and focus on your smartphone.
We’ve seen couples in restaurants who never talk among themselves – each fiddled with their iPhone through the whole meal. Is that progress or what?
Since the 21st century began, the average US household has lost income. Bummer. Why has this happened?
One answer we proposed to readers of our new monthly publication, The Bill Bonner Letter, was that three of the leading economic zones – the US, Europe and Japan – have come to be dominated by old people.
But that explains only a part of it… and probably not the major part.
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