Are you happy today? How are you feeling? Do you enjoy your life? Do these questions even matter? Well, according to the the newly released "World Happiness Report 2017", these questions matter a lot economically. This world happiness report is based on surveying 1,000 countries in 150 countries who are to rate their happiness levels on a scale of zero to ten. The goal of these surveys is "to redefine the growth narrative to put people's well-being at the center of government's efforts". Surprisingly, the results of the happiest countries like Norway, Switzerland, and Denmark, have been more slow to grow than the world in general. Comparing this to the U.S, we don't exactly look like the cheeriest people out there. To be fair, comparing us to economically and population-wise small countries such as these isn't a fair enough fight to bash us unhappy Americans. Even as different as we are in size, our economies are fairly similar. This new way of determining which countries are flourishing by broad surveys on how happy someone feels today is not only giving false ideas, but its teaching us that economic growth is just about attaining more and better things. It's also about how rising prosperity can create a deeper and more flourishing life for the future.
Economic growth may not be sufficient to creating a better world for more people, but it sure seems necessary."
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/03/06/middlebury-engages-soul-searching-after-speech-shouted-down-and-professor-attacked
About a week ago, Middlebury College in Vermont broke out in outrage from the appearance of Charles Murray who was supposed to speak on their campus. "What transpired instead felt like a scene from Homeland rather than an evening at an institution of higher learning." Says Allison Stanger, a political scientist who is a professor at Middlebury College. She was called to moderate the lecture from Charles Murray. These frail, easily offended "cupcakes" had mustered up their strength to cause so much of a riot, they surrounded Stanger and Murray, and physically attacked Allison by yanking her hair to the point of her requiring a neck brace the next day. Many from Middlebury claim that this behavior was shocking from their students to a guest speaker; this information got a pretty good chortle out of me, that this is a surprising behavior from the same students that are holding puppies in their safe spaces, calling any passerby a bigot for not agreeing with them. In another article by Bernard Goldberg, had much to say about these students and their immature behavior. He also touches on the exact reason these students are so opposed to Charles Murray's speaking is because of a book he wrote, "The Bell Curve", in 1944. the book's context itself had some controversial writing, because it linked intelligence levels to "heredity and briefly brought race into the discussion," says Goldberg. With this information alone, Murray is labeled a racist to said cupcakes.
All of this outrage and temper tantrums have very meaningful reasons behind them, I'm sure, but when push comes to shove it boils down to one word i can think of that summarizes this: exhausting. Yes, we understand the upset and mourning people have over Hillary's loss of presidency, and that some will go as far as they see fit to go against everything our current president says and stands for. But personally, I find that resisting mercilessly will get you nowhere, leaving you exhausted and the only one in tears at the end.
“The first Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, warned that the ‘abandonment of the protective policy by the American government [will] produce want and ruin among our people.'" This week during his address to Congress, President Trump quoted Abraham Lincoln, America's first Republican President, on international trade. Now as honest and as Lincoln was, and as strong as a supporter he was of keeping hold the union, his thoughts and actions on trade weren't as correct as he wanted them to be.
Comparing trade issues then to trade now has some drastic differences; one of them being that America's economic growth relied on free trade within the states, not international trade. Our "toddler" of a country was growing- fast. From crawling on all fours to teething, we were growing at rapid paces, meaning our resources were growing and adding to the national economy. However, free trade within the country is not our major issue anymore. Granted, there's always going to be hat one successful Shark Tank of a business that will only trade and manufacture in America, but as a whole, our job is to keep up with the fastest growers; even if that's not us. In order for our economy to grow at its best we need to trade with the parts of the world that is growing fastest.
Lincoln most likely saw the best in our situation then, seeing a fine job in the marketplace and holding our own. This probably hindered him from seeing the need or benefits of working across national borders. Unfortunately, he failed to see David Ricardo's concept of "comparative thinking", meaning you should never be a 'jack of all trades but master of none.' Meaning it's not effective to attempt to be a self sufficient country (or person) because you just can't be good at everything. As harsh as it sounds, there's always going to be someone out there who is better at you at something; but if you can't beat them, join them.
I personally have struggled with the mindset of being self-sufficient, thinking and convincing myself that I'm capable of doing everything on my own; part of it being an issue of pride, and not wanting the dependency of another individual. However, the outcome of my stubbornness was a loss for myself. You may think you're strong if you can do it on your own, but there comes a time where having an ally can make you stronger. Did Lincoln have the same thinking about our young country? That we didn't need anyone else's help because we were managing on our own? Perhaps he was right for a moment, but when push comes to shove, finding someone who has different strengths as you to team up with can build you up even more. President Lincoln's intentions for our country truly were for the best, and if he were here today, his thoughts on trade likely would have evolved to the economic experience of the coming years. "Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken." (Ecclesiastes 4:12)
