The World Economic Forum recently released, “The Global Competitiveness Report 2012-2013,” that ranks 144 countries, on everything from “Organized Crime,” to the “Quality of Overall Infrastructure,” and the “Protection of Minority Shareholders. “ No. 1 represents the best nation and No. 144 represents the worst nation. America did very poorly almost everywhere other than Gross Domestic Product where we ranked first. This is yet another message about a system that no longer works or at least a system that works well only for the top 1%.
Here’s a look at some of the few places we ranked in the top 10:
Strength of Investor Protection No. 5
Quality of Scientific Research Institutions No. 6
And on Venture Capital Availability No. 10
In most cases we did nowhere near as well.
Quality of the Educational System No. 28
Reliability of Police Services No. 30
Health Care No. 34
Diversion of Public Funds [due to corruption] the U.S. ranks No. 34
Quality of Primary Education No. 38
Infant Mortality No. 41
Cooperation in Labor-Management Relations No. 42
Quality of Math and Science Education No. 47
Transparency of Governmental Policymaking No. 56
Public Trust in Politicians No. 54
Primary Education Enrollment Rate No.58
Favoritism in Decisions of Government Officials (otherwise known as governmental cronyism) No. 59
Soundness of Banks No. 80
Wastefulness of Government Spending No. 6
Organized Crime No. 87
Government Debt [as a % of GDP] No. 136
The nations that stand high on most of these lists are Finland, Switzerland, Singapore, New Zealand, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Japan, Canada, Qatar, Netherlands, Iceland, Ireland, and Hong Kong.
The nations that generally rank in the bottom, other than the US are the ones that are typically cited as being “developing” countries.