Financial Thought Leader Niall Ferguson discusses why the centuries long dominance of Western economic and political power is waning and what the United States needs to do prevent it from slipping even more. He also discusses the “fairy story” that government intervention was not the main catalyst behind stock and commodity surges from 2009 to 2011, and why the present phase of liquidity tightening is reversing that trend.
Follow
____________________________
Cory’s Chart Corner
;
On the issue of education, not many people have looked at the issue of illiteracy in Commonwealth countries (compared to other Western countries). It is very apparent to any linguist of any notoriety that the system that the English language is is atrociously backward; English’s phonemicity (the relationship between the sound [phoneme] and letters is abysmal), which makes reading (and writing) difficult to learn. Yet, not many people in the system and in the culture want to do anything to address these issues by reforming English, like other cultures have done with their language (to make it more efficient). Everyone is so scared to change English! Yet, in one generation, it could be done and the old dinosaurs (like I am) would not need to learn the new system. Yet, the vested interests and the elite would probably continue to oppose such a change since they have a monopoly on having learn a language that provide them with class and money. The end is near if changes don’t take place! Don’t say I did not warn you!
Final correction:
Yet, the vested interests and the elite would probably continue to oppose such a change since they have a monopoly on having learned a language that provides them with class/status and money.
Niall paints a nice picture for the East. But where would the East be if the West wasn’t giving them our industry, patents, jobs and money? The most important ‘killer app’ the East has is Western corporate greed and Western leadership beholden to the greedy corporations.