Just Another Guy in the Room

For a long while, and even to a certain extent now, the United States is a world leader and has certain self-proclaimed authority to assert itself. We were the one in charge, but that power is shifting -- or rather, it's being spread out among other countries. We are becoming just another guy in the room of nations; granted, we are still one of the tough guys, but there are others, too.

It's difficult to think of any areas in which we are bringing up the rear, and it's also difficult to think of any modern areas in which we are in the forefront. One of the biggest factors in development -- education -- though, shows us that we are not doing as well as we may think. 2009 data shows that the U.S. is somewhere in the middle of the top 34 countries, ranking significantly lower in math than in science or reading. Over the last several years, we have been either steady or slowly dropping in scores while other countries, including those who are low in the ranks, are improving. We are indeed highly ranked on the education index, but this only accounts for literacy rates and education enrollment rates.

What about happiness? We are all people with a finite time on this planet, so naturally we want to be happy in life. If a country is doing well in the global market, it doesn't really matter if its citizens are miserable. Similarly, it shouldn't be as big of a problem if we're "just another guy in the room" so long as we are very happy. Of course, "happiness" is a difficult thing to measure on a national scale, though some organizations are attempting to establish such studies. Similarly, the Happy Planet Index measures the "ecological efficiency of supporting well-being" within countries. Here, the U.S. ranks incredibly low at number 150 in the year 2006, though we rose to 114 in 2009. It may seem surprising that certain countries, like Cuba, rank highly in this index, but the HPI does not look at political and economical factors that often make countries undesirable in our view. "The HPI is based on general utilitarian principles — that most people want to live long and fulfilling lives, and the country which is doing the best is the one that allows its citizens to do so, whilst avoiding infringing on the opportunity of future people and people in other countries to do the same."

It should be obvious that no single index is perfect and that no measure can capture every aspect of the very complex and dynamic machines that are countries. It should also be obvious that the United States is not an unchallenged leader in the global arena, and that we should pay careful attention to our nation and the nations around us.