Shocking Economics Revisited

America Standing Tall

Patton Lives

American Solutions

American Solutions is an organization designed to break through partisanship and create real solutions to the problems facing our country. It is part of Winning The Future, A 21st Century Contract With America. Unlike other organizations that just identify and talk about issues, American Solutions has created the "Solutions Lab" which offers plans to make real change. The Lab breaks down issues into values, vision, and a metric for monitoring, achieving, and evaluating results. American Solutions is directed by Newt Gingrich. Check out videos here or the main web site here.

Young America's Foundation

The Young America's Foundation is an organization intent on fostering the conservative movement in young people on school campuses across the nation. In addition to sponsoring and organizing various activism events, YAF also hosts some very prominent conservative speakers. Speakers have included Newt Gingrich, John Ashcroft, Ann Coulter, and Bay Buchanan. You can see videos from YAF here. Learn more about the foundation on their web site here.

Stand Up Economist

More Shocking Economics Buzz

The buzz over our Shocking Economics video has continued to grow. Political consultant and author, Wyatt McIntyre posted the video on his blog and also had some nice things to say about the American Freedom University. He also maintains a YouTube channel here. Both are well worth a look. In addition, here are a few more places that have been talking about the video.

Patriot Action posted it here.
Fort Hard Knox posted it here.
The Minority Report posted it here.
Heavy Lifting posted it here.
Capitalism & Freedom posted it here.
Caulk Is Cheap posted it here.
Blogonomics posted it here.
The Patriot Room posted it here.

U.S. Military Deaths

According to a study by the Congressional Research Service, U.S. military deaths are at or below average peace time levels.

(Click chart for larger image.)

Click here for a pdf file of the full CRS report.

Remember Me

Amazing tribute to our troops by Lizzie Palmer



Related links:
Operation Gratitude
ThisIsForTheSoldiers.org

Educational Rap

The trick of education is to relate information in a way students can understand. Enter, a company that merges education and music. But not just any music, rap music. Educational music that students might actually listen to. They call themselves Rhythm Rhyme Results and they maintain an impressive catalog of educational rap. There are songs in the categories of social studies, language arts, and math. They even have a song about economics which was posted on a blog here, and inspired us to take a closer look. We're especially fond of their work in the area of U.S. history with songs that cover topics ranging from the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights to the Civil War and the Civil Rights Movement.

Listen to the full Rhythm Rhyme Results music catalog here.

Democracy Countdown

The following commentary on democracy has been floating around the internet for some time now:

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.

The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

• From bondage to spiritual faith;
• From spiritual faith to great courage;
• From courage to liberty;
• From liberty to abundance;
• From abundance to complacency;
• From complacency to apathy;
• From apathy to dependence;
• From dependence back into bondage.

This quotation is generally attributed to Alexander Fraser Tytler (or Alexander Tyler as he is more commonly referred to today) although this is still unverified. We may never know who first wrote these words, but the information presented is something to thoughtfully consider.

For more information about the origin of the above quotation, look here.

Shocking Economics Buzz

Our Shocking Economics video has been posted and linked to on a variety of blogs. Here is a list of what we have been able to find so far. Take a look and see what other people are saying about the video.

Greg Mankiw's Blog posted it here.
RedState posted it here.
The Powell Center for Economic Literacy blogged about it here.
Carpe Diem mentions it here and here.
Consumption Rules posted it here.
Thinking On The Margin posted it here.
Caveat Bettor posted it here.
Right Truth posted it here.
William Yu's Blog posted it here.
The Scratching Post posted it here.
Thinking Things Through posted it here.
ThreeSources posted it here.
AP Economics posted it here.

Overachieving At GDP

An interesting analysis of GDP, technology, and education is presented by Scott McLeod (contributed to the "Did You Know/Shift Happens" presentation by Karl Fisch) on his Dangerously Irrelevant blog. Apparently the post was inspired by Shocking Economics. Special thanks to those who called this to our attention.

http://www.dangerouslyirrelevant.org/2007/11/gdp-overachieve.html

Shocking Economics Text

Here is the content from the Shocking Economics video in text. Added by popular request.

-----

1. The entire economic output of oil-rich foreign power Iraq ($13.4 billion GDP) – is less than one third of Rhode Island ($45.6 billion).

2. The entire economic output of Afgahnistan ($8.4 billion GDP) – totals far less than half of Vermont ($24.2 billion).

3. The entire economic output of oil-rich foreign power Iran ($213 billion GDP) – is less than Maryland ($257 billion).

4. The entire economic output of oil-rich foreign power Saudi Arabia ($349 billion GDP) – is less than 85% of New Jersey ($434 billion).

5. The entire combined economic output of all the oil-rich Middle East nations (Saudia Arabia, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Syria, Yemen, Jordan, & Iraq – a combined $998 billion GDP) – is 40% less than California ($1.72 trillion).

6. The entire annual economic output of foreign super-power Russia ($979 billion GDP) – totals less than the state of New York ($1.02 trillion).

7. The entire economic output of foreign super-power China ($2.631 trillion GDP) – is less than just two US states combined – Texas & California ($2.748 trillion).

The USA exceeds the size of the world’s #2 ranked nation’s economy by more than 3 times…a gap of more than $8.8 trillion annually, and widening every year.

Just the difference between the total economic output of the USA and the world’s #2 ranked nation…that $8.8 trillion…exceeds the entire economies of 161 different foreign countries combined.

The United States exceeds the size of the world’s #3 ranked nation’s economy by more than 4 times...over $10 trillion annually.

Those two nations whose economies rank 2^nd and 3^rd among all other countries on earth today were defeated by the USA in World War II and were then rebuilt on American principles of government:

Japan #2
and Germany #3

Together, the USA, Japan, and Germany generate more economic output than 174 other nations combined…that’s over 42% of the entire world’s economic activity.

Since 1776, the American principles of

(1) Individual freedom
(2) Democratic self-government
(3) A free-market economy

have built the USA into the greatest economic engine in the history of nations.

-----

These comparisons are based upon published reports for the 181 nations of The International Monetary Fund. Similar findings will result from comparisons based upon published reports of The World Bank.

Investigate further here:
List of Countries by GDP
List of US States by GDP

VIDEO

Shocking Economics Video