Study: America falls to 18th in economic freedom
According to the Economic Freedom of the World Annual Report on the US, America has fell to 18th in the world rankings. America has historically been near the top every year, not anymore.
As MKH reported the top 10 nations are: Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand, Switzerland, Australia and Canada (tied), Bahrain, Mauritius, Finland, Chile. The lowest ranked countries: Venezuela was lowest, followed by Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Republic of Congo, and Angola.
The study was conducted by the The Fraser Institute, a free-market think tank in Canada, and the Washington-based Cato Institute use 41 measures of economic freedom to rank 144 countries. Here’s their definition of economic freedom:
Individuals have economic freedom when property they acquire without the use of force, fraud, or theft is protected from physical invasions by others and they are free to use, exchange, or give their property as long as their actions do not violate the identical rights of others. An index of economic freedom should measure the extent to which rightly acquired property is protected and individuals are engaged in voluntary transactions.
Here’s what happen to the US according to the study:
Much of America’s decline is due to the growth of the government’s footprint in our lives since 2000. The assault on American property rights has not helped matters, either. The war on terror put American travelers under the thumb of the TSA—an entity that combines the charm of the DMV, the might of a paramilitary force, and the impropriety of a fraternity hazing. The Supreme Court’s Kelo decision ushered in a rise in eminent domain abuses. And let’s not forget the bailouts of those corporations that were “too big to fail.”
Taxpayers, on the other hand, were just the right size to fail, and that is what happened to them when the government took their money to pay off big, failing businesses.
H/T Hotair
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