For most of the last 100+ years the United States of America has been the economic “super power” that the world did all it could to be like. It is my opinion that we achieved this by two things.
First, we had true freedom. We had the freedom to succeed in America and to the dismay of many the freedom to fail. People crossed seas, crossed boarders and defected at risk of death to give themselves a chance at that freedom.
Secondly, we where a nation of producers. We produced the best products, the most innovating products and the most wanted products the world over. We made televisions, cars, clothing and entertainment better then anyone else in the world and the world came to America to shop.
Countries did all they could to make trading with America as easy as possible. Look at what the world did at the Bretton Woods conference, the world choose to tie their currency to the US dollar. You want another example? Where was the United Nations HQ? That’s right, New York City in the United States of America. So was the World Trade Center prior to 9/11.
But now things are changing and there is no bigger sign to this then the actions of the little island of Samoa. Today is Thursday December 29th in Samoa, like it is in America, but tomorrow will not be Friday December 30th. At midnight tonight in Samoa they will skip Friday and go directly to Saturday December 31st, why would they do this? To make trading with China easier.
You see, Samoa has for a long time been located in the latest time zone in the world, just one hour away from the international date line and China was a 23 hours ahead of Samoa. So to make trade easier with China the country of Samoa will sacrifice a full day from their calendar and because the new land of the rising sun as they enter the earliest possible time zone.
Now this will have little effect on your life in America, but it it is another straw on the back of the American economic power position and we don’t know which straw will brake that back. There is talk of eliminating the US Dollar as the world currency and switching to an IMF currency, just another straw. Of course there is the increased trade deficit we currently have with China and other Asian nations, another straw. How many straws can we take?
America done right 