Houston, a Glimpse into America’s More Caring Future?

The 2011 Kinder Houston Area Survey took in a representative sample of 750 Harris County residents—including 240 respondents contacted by cell phone. The University of Houston administered the survey. Survey author, Stephen Klineberg, co-director of the Kinder Institute and professor of sociology, said:

Houston is where America’s four major ethnic communities—Anglos, Asians, blacks and Latinos—meet in more equal numbers than almost anywhere else in the country. The challenges and opportunities of creating a more unified and inclusive multiethnic society will be seen here first.

As a city at the forefront of the country’s demographic revolution, Klineberg thought that Houston offers a glimpse into America’s future, and the survey’s assessment of the city may offer important lessons for strengthening the rest of the country:

• create policies that moderate the inequalities
• nurture a far more educated workforce
• develop cities into environmentally and aesthetically appealing destinations
• empower all members of a multiethnic society.

Though Texas is a red state traditionally wanting less government, a majority of Houstonians today (52 percent) said that government has a responsibility to help reduce the inequalities between rich and poor in America (up from 45 percent in 2009). This year 48 percent said that “government should do more to solve our country’s problems” (up from 36 percent in 1996). 72 percent of respondents thought most poor people in the US today are poor because of circumstances they can’t control (up from 68 percent in 2007, and 52 percent in 1999). Although 86 percent agreed “if you work hard in this city, eventually you will succeed”, 67 percent also think “people who work hard and live by the rules are not getting a fair break these days”.

Respondents are a bit more upbeat in their personal economic outlooks—26 percent (up from 20 percent in 2010) report improving personal financial conditions—but remain pessimistic about the long term national prospects—only 31 percent (down from 43 percent in 2007) believe that young people will eventually have a higher standard of living than adult Americans today:

Houstonians feel that the bleeding has stopped, but a robust recovery is not yet on the horizon.

Stephen Klineberg

78 percent disagreed with the statement “A high school education is enough to get a good job”. The percent of people who spontaneously mentioned education when asked to name the biggest problem facing people in Houston jumped to 7.6 percent this year from just 1.7 percent in 2009 and 2 percent in 2010:

There’s a new awareness that this is now a high tech, knowledge based economy and there aren’t many good jobs for people without a college education. Education is more important than ever. Long gone are the days when you could get a job out of high school, work hard and make enough money until you retire. The resources of the knowledge economy are not found in factories, they are situated between the ears of the best and brightest, who can live anywhere.

Klineberg

Public support for new initiatives to improve the quality of life in Houston has remained firm or grown stronger across the 30 years of the survey. Area residents support measures to enhance the city’s green spaces and bayous, revitalize and preserve urban centers and improve air and water quality.

Though most respondents (52 percent) said they would prefer to live in a single family residential area, a large minority (45 percent) would choose an area with a mix of homes, shops and restaurants. In 2010, 41 percent said they’d prefer a smaller home within walking distance of shops and workplaces, rather than a single family home with a big yard “where you would need to drive almost everywhere you want to go”.

Asked how they would feel if a close relative of theirs wanted to marry a non-Anglo, 8 percent of the Anglo respondents this year said they would disapprove, down from 13 percent in 2002 and 23 percent in 1995. Among the Anglo respondents under the age of 30, 93 percent said they would approve of such intermarriage, compared with 69 percent of those 60 or older. Seventy percent of Anglos under 30, but only 35 percent in the older group, said that the increasing immigration into this country today mostly strengthens American culture. 73 percent of the younger respondents, compared with 52 percent of those 60 or older, said they are in favor of granting illegal immigrants a path to legal citizenship if they speak English and have no criminal record.

So, older Houstonians’ attitudes toward diversity, which will continue growing rapidly, are in conflict with younger Anglos more comfortable with the demographic trends.

Shopping Addiction—Thinking it Can Change Your Life!

People who overuse credit have different beliefs about products from those who spend within their means. Professor Marsha Richins says many people buy products thinking that the items will make them happier and transform their lives. Simultaneously such consumer materialism induces in them a disregard for debt. These two forces work together to increase credit abuse and overuse.

Wanting to buy products becomes a problem when people expect unreasonable degrees of change in their lives from their purchases. Some people tend to ascribe almost magical properties to goods—that buying things will make them happier, cause them to have more fun, improve their relationships—in short, transform their lives. These beliefs are fallacious for the most part, but nonetheless can be powerful motivators for people to spend.

Materialistic types hope for four kinds of changes when making purchases, but earlier research shows that these expectations are often not fulfilled. The four kinds of transformations expected are:

1. Transformation of the self—the belief that a purchase will change who you are and how people perceive you. This is commonly held by young people and people in new roles. Example—a woman wanted cosmetic dental surgery to improve her appearance and self-confidence.
2. Transformation of relationships—the expectation that a purchase will give someone more or better relationships with others. Example, a woman wanted to buy a new home because she thought it would enable her to entertain more often and make more friends.
3. Hedonic transformation—a purchase will make life more fun. Example, a man wanted a mountain bike because he thought it would give him more incentive to get out and go on “an adventure”.
4. Efficacy transformation—the expectation that purchases will make people more effective in their lives. Example, some people wanted to buy a vehicle because they thought it would make them more independent and self-reliant.

In proportion, none of these are a problem. They can be for people who have strong and unrealistic transformational beliefs, for then they are more likely than others to overuse credit and take on excessive debt. Other research by Fang and Mowen, 2009, and Netemeyer, et al, 1998 has also shown a relationship between materialism and gambling, and yet more by Mowen and Spears, 1999, and Ridgway, Kukar-Kinney, and Monroe, 2008, between materialism and compulsive consumption.

It is further evidence that our economic system is damaging to us, and professor Ritchins seems to agree. She thinks finance and credit counseling should be revised to help people understand their motivations for purchasing goods better, and recognize that products are not a quick fix for improving their lives:

Many financial literacy programs seek to prevent people from getting into financial problems by presenting the facts about interests rate and loans, but few seek to influence behavior directly, or focus on why people purchase things they cannot afford, and go into debt.

Is the Wagon Rolling Against the Robbing Rich?

Amid the recent fiscal carnage in Washington several studies of the US have been published concerning the situation of the average American. First, IMF economists analyzed the US public deficit and debt levels, and their relation to the demands aging Baby Boomers will place on the government’s Medicare and Medicaid healthcare programs, while the birth rate lags at a record low:

The United States is facing an untenable fiscal situation due to the combination of high fiscal deficits, an aging population and rapid growth in government provided healthcare benefits.

IMF study, An Analysis of US Fiscal and Generational Imbalances:
Who Will Pay and How?

To “go a long way in returning the United States to a fiscally sustainable path”, the US government must cut the entitlement programs and especially healthcare—among the most expensive in the world—that face rapidly rising costs in coming years. Americans will have to pay more taxes and the government will have to cut spending on Baby Boomers—those Americans between about 45 and 65—and their immediate heirs.

To eliminate all current deficits and long term shortfalls on social plans for the current generation “would require all taxes to go up and all transfers to be cut immediately and permanently by 35 percent”, and “delay in the adjustment makes it more costly”.

Unless currently living Americans pay more in net taxes or unless government spending on current generations is curtailed, future Americans will face net tax rates that are about 21.5 percentage points… higher than those facing current newborn Americans.

Of course, the IMF is an arm of US foreign policy, or rather, an arm of the international policies of the US uber rich class who rule the world for the sole purpose of making themselves richer than their already obscene levels of riches. The IMF always makes the people pay whenever the rulers of any country get its finances in a twist by their greedy machinations. The ruling clique in the US are among the main beneficiaries usually. It is time they paid! Normally, they pay least, often nothing!

But the average Yankee seems amazingly placid, or gets worked up over the wrong enemy, all too often supporting the greedy manipulators because they are all too easy to fool. Often, they seem to think that they are themselves among the uber rich, but less than a single percent of the population are. That one percent have gotten three times richer in real terms over the last 30 years, while the average Yankee has got poorer once inflation is accounted for.

Not surprisingly, more Americans say that their financial situation is worse not better in recent years. For the first time since 1972, 31.5 percent of Americans are “not at all” satisfied with their financial situation compared with 23.4 percent who are “pretty well” satisfied (General Social Survey, NORC, University of Chicago).

Americans are also more insecure about employment. A record 16.4 percent thought it “likely” (fairly or very) that they would lose their job or be laid off. As few as 52.2 percent thought it “not at all likely” that they would lose their job or be laid off, easily the lowest confidence ever recorded by the GSS. Those who thought their standard of living was “much better” or “somewhat better” than their parents declined.

The General Social Survey—which NORC has conducted for forty years based on 2,044 interviews—is a biennial survey that gathers data on contemporary American society to monitor and explain trends and constants in attitudes, behaviors, and attributes.

On top of these, American “happiness” has been measured and took some blows, but some American stoicism shone through here. While only 28.8 percent of Americans, the lowest percentage since 1972, were “happy”, another 14.2 percent were “not too happy”. Happiness was hit mainly because of the economy and people’s own finances. Even so, 85.8 percent of Americans were “happy”.

Not all aspects of happiness fell during the downturn. 97 percent of marriages were judged to be “happy” (very or pretty), and 86.0 percent of Americans claim to be “very satisfied” or “moderately satisfied” with their work, a steady average since 1972.

If anything, it suggests that the average American lives in a cocoon. They are concerned for themselves and their immediate family, and are satisfied that they are not being repossessed like the family over the street, and still have a job to hang on to. Despite the hugely vaunted Christianity of the Christian nation, the average American is indifferent to his neighbour, as long as he’s all right.

The motto is not “Do unto others as you would be done by”, it is “I’m all right, Bud, You look after yourself”.

Fortunately, recent proposed cuts in public services have been firmly rebutted by encouraging united strength and purpose. Is the US sleeping Leviathan waking up? Let’s hope so, then you smug financiers, corporate bosses, bankers and bought men will have to watch out! Once enough of the people stop being taken in by the great Washington Repucrat-Demoblican farce, then the wagon of unity may be rolling, and the callous and greedy exploiters of the rest of us will be crushed by its irresistible momentum.

Empathy—the Hallmark of a Compassionate and Civilised Society

Science is beginning to unravel the mystery of why some people have less empathy than others and the implications are potentially far reaching, not least for the criminal justice system:

Empathy itself is the most valuable resource in our world. It might even have relevance for politics and politicians, so that when we try and resolve conflict, whether it’s domestic conflict or international conflict, issues about empathy might actually be useful. Given this assertion, it is puzzling that in the school curriculum empathy figures hardly at all, and in politics, business, the courts or policing it is rarely if ever on the agenda. We can see examples among our political leaders of the value of empathy, as when Nelson Mandela and FW de Klerk sought to understand and befriend each other, crossing the divide in Apartheid South Africa, but the same has not yet been achieved between Israel and Palestine, or between Washington and Iraq or Afghanistan. And, for every day that empathy is not employed in such corners of the world, more lives are lost.

Simon Baron-Cohen

Baron-Cohen adds:

The hallmark of a compassionate and civilised society is that we try to understand other people’s actions, we don’t try to simply condemn them. There is even a question about whether a person that commits an awful crime should be in a prison as opposed to a hospital. When people commit crimes, there may be determinants of their behaviour which are outside their control. No one is responsible for their own genes.

More at http://mikemagee.wordpress.com/2011/04/10/empathy-the-universal-solvent.

A Tale of Two Countries

Libya—a Rogue State

We found out last night that the British parliament is not a coalition of the Conservative party and the Liberal Democrats, it includes the Labour Party. When it comes to warfare, the UK has only one party—the Gang of Three. The House of Commons voted by 557 to 13 to support the UN resolution 1973 on Libya. The thirteen MPs with the principle to vote against were:

John Baron (C: Basildon & Billericay), Graham Allen (L: Nottingham North), Ronnie Campbell (L: NBlyth Valley), Jeremy Corbyn (L: NIslington North), Barry Gardiner (L: NBrent North), Roger Godsiff (L: NBirmingham Hall Green), John McDonnell (L: NHayes and Harlington), Linda Riordan (L: NHalifax), Dennis Skinner (L: NBolsover), Mike Wood (L: NBatley and Spen), Katy Clark (L: NNorth Ayrshire and Arran), Yasmin Qureshi (L: NBolton South-East), Caroline Lucas (Green: Brighton Pavilion), Mark Durkan (SDLP: Foyle), Margaret Ritchie (SDLP: Down South).

The rest either abstained, showing they are good for nothing, or voted for yet another middle eastern war. These people have no excuse. They have seen what Blair and Bush did in Iraq and what is happening in Afghanistan, but they are so lacking in principle and dripping in opportunistic self satisfaction that they ignored what they know… for self advancement. They are not fit to be MPs. They are not fit to be in Parliament. Parliament requires an opposition or it is as much a dictatorship as Libya. What is the point of choosing a representative when all of them vote according to the script that suits the MP and not what the citizens they represent want.

These people have killed democracy as we know it. As we know it it is pointless, and it needs now to be re-thought. The present system is a careerist gravy train for crooks, who, on this vote, outnumber principled MPs 43 to 1. We cannot expect Parliament to reform itself, so we, the people, will have to reform it as we have had to do in the seventeenth century, and twice in the nineteenth century by revolution and the threat of revolution. Britons died on these occasions, and doubtless the same will again be true. To achieve fairness and justice ordinary people always die.

Will the French, Americans and Arabs be organizing a humanitarian “No Fly Zone” over the UK when our government turns the troops against its people? No chance! If anything, they will do the same as in Libya. The “No Fly Zone” over Libya is obviously… obviously… not a humanitarian venture.

Just how do you save people from being killed by bombing them? It is exactly the same in Afghanistan where even Karzai, the US stooge, now wants the US and its lapdogs out, after a series of mass murders of civilians, often by US drones. It shows the poltroonery of the US and its allies. They are doing their best to engage the enemy by robots in case they might get killed themselves, so they sent pilotless aircraft to target schools and weddings, anywhere where there seems to be a gathering of people on the assumption that it is a troop of rebels.

And to what purpose? How does an ordinary Briton or American benefit from this wanton brutality? We do not. A few people employed servicing the military will briefly enjoy secure employment, but the rest of us will have to pay for this adventure, as we paid for the previous ones, by job losses and tax hikes. The beneficiaries are the rich, not us. And, when we choose to rebel against our rich dictators, the rich will use the technology they are perfecting abroad against us.

Israel—a Rogue State

Perhaps something will come out of it. It is wishful thinking, but goes like this.

Since all these MPs think it proper to support the bombing of nations that they claim a humanitarian reason for doing, they ought now to be willing to support the bombing of Israel, a rogue state which has different laws for Jews and Arabs among its own citizenry, and frequently raids Gaza, a small patch of land packed with millions of Arabs who are not Israeli citizens. Israel’s “democratic” authorities have even revoked the residency permit of the Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem. Despite efforts by the Archbishop of Canterbury, the British Foreign Secretary and the British ambassador, the Israelis have not relented.

After maintaining a deafening silence about Israel’s atrocities against civilians, Britain suddenly wants a “day of reckoning” for war criminals—as long as they are Libyan.

Stuart Littlewood

The UK Foreign Secretary William Hague, promised retribution for Gaddafi’s crimes, and to refer Libya to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court:

That sends a clear message to all involved, in the regime and any other groups that if they commit crimes and atrocities there will be a day of reckoning for them.

Crimes will not go unpunished and will not be forgotten. There will be a day of reckoning and the reach of international justice is long.

British diplomats expressed the ConDem coalition’s policy as taking whatever steps were necessary…

…to ensure that those responsible for the awful human rights violations that are currently occurring in Libya are held to account… [because] we are appalled by the levels of violence… [so] The United Kingdom will do everything we can to make sure those responsible in the Libyan regime are held accountable for their actions…

Why then did we not hear this highly principled, humanitarian Foreign Secretary call for a reckoning with the Israeli regime? It murdered 1400 of Gaza’s civilians, including hundreds of children, two years ago, at Christmas! Besides the murder, the attacks left thousands maimed and myriads homeless, having to live in rubble. One UN resolution was sufficient for the bombing of Libya, but very many UN resolutions have been passed regarding Israeli oppression of Palestinians with absolutely no response at all from these humanitarian leaders of ours.

HMS York instantly appeared unloading medical supplies for the Benghazi Medical Centre, donated by the Swedish government, but nothing was available to assist when Gaza was under attack from Israeli bombers, or when Israeli soldiers acted as pirates on the high seas hijacking a Turkish ship carrying similar humanitarian aid to Gazans who are oppressed, humiliated, and impoverished every day by Israeli attacks.

Instead of seeking justice for Israeli crimes the Foreign Office is trying to change international law to let the Israeli criminals who authorized and justified them, like Tzipi Livni, Avigdor Lieberman, Ehud Barak and Binyamin Netanyahu, to move freely in the west.

Prominent Zionist Jews, who are knee jerk supporters of Israel, whatever atrocities they commit, are among the supporters of western political parties, and western leaders pander to these Zionists because they will finance them. David Cameron told a Jewish dinner, according to the Jerusalem Post:

With me you have a prime minister whose belief in Israel is indestructible… I will always be a strong defender of the Jewish people. I will always be an advocate for the State of Israel.

Cameron promises to support the Zionist state of Israel “always”—whatever crimes it commits! And then he cynically equates “the Jewish people” with Israel, so is it any wonder that some people do the same and attack Jews wherever they are for the crimes of Zionist Israel? Anti-Semitic attacks are on the increase, the Chief Rabbi of the UK tells us, as if it should be surprising when so many of them are Zionists—Jewish fascists! But all Jews are not Zionists, and all Jews do not support the racialist attitude of Israel, including some Israeli Jews.

Western uncritical support of Zionism is why Israel gets away with what Gaddafi cannot, why anti-Semitism is increasing, and why also the megarich oil sheiks of the Arabian peninsula can oppress their own people without a word of criticism from western leaders like Hague, Cameron, Obama and Clinton, all of whom get more two faced and slimy by the second. If you are an Arab rebel make sure you choose who you are rebelling against. If it is Gaddafi—OK, you are a democrat. If the king of Saudi Arabia—bad news, you are a terrorist.

War is a massacre of people who don’t know each other for the profit of people who know each other but don’t massacre each other.

Paul Valery

Invading foreign countries is for the benefit of a narrow class of megarich people, who like to steal other people’s assets and benefit from war bucks whatever else happens.

Our Heroic Leaders Lead us into a Fruitless War Again! Why?

Well, here we go again. We are three days into another crusade against the Moslems. Western leaders inevitably deny it, but it has become essential for us to effect regime change over certain Moslem leaders, some of whom, like Gaddafi and the late Saddam Hussein, who used to be so much in favour that western arms dealers sold them billions worth of modern weapons. Only a few weeks ago, the latest grubby British leader to emulate the avaricious and unprincipled T Blair, “Dave” Cameron, was selling arms personally to Arab sheiks and kings. Now he is sending “our boys” to risk death flying over Libya to bomb the poor souls beneath, to save them from being bombed by Gaddafi! Could anything be more hypocritical?

The spokesman for the Arab League did not think so. He complained that the Arabs understood a “no fly zone” was to stop Gaddafi’s aeroplanes from flying, not to stop Libyans from living, whether supporters of Gaddafi or rebels. Plainly Cameron and his vile coalition, including Obama, intend to weight the civil war, which until last week looked favorable to Gaddafi, heavily towards the rebels. No one seems to know what proportion of the Libyans oppose Gaddafi. They quickly seemed to capture the north eastern corner of the country around Benghazi, then could make no more progress. The bulk of Libya seems to prefer their present leader to some western puppet.

“Dave” admits he wants to see regime change, admitting that his objectives are the same as Blair’s and Bush’s in Iraq, but pretends the terms of the UN resolution 1973 forbid it. Even so, almost the first blow struck was a cruise missile strike against an important administrative building in Tripoli where there was a chance that Gaddafi might be himself killed. While the direct objective cannot be Gaddafi, “Dave” explains, he can be legitimately targeted because the UN resolution said all means can be used to stop Libyan civilians from being killed, so killing one Libyan civilian can be legitimate on those grounds, and, naturally, many others might be killed colaterally—sad that!

Hypocrisy

Meanwhile the hypocrisy of taking precipitate action against some oil rich dictators while favoring other equally unpleasant or worse oil rich dictators passes by the half of our knowing electorate that happily soak up every lie the BBC, Murdoch and company sling at them. Simultaneously with the rebellion against Gaddafi the people of Bahrein rebelled against their king, who after being forced to say he was willing to concede some reforms, was obliged by an unyielding public, to bring in the Saudi Arabian army, an army that is the personal arm-twister of the Saud family who rule Arabia.

Arabia is the best friend of all opportunistic western leaders because of their oil, and their oil wealth, which again makes them prime customers for arms dealers. The arms they sold were used against a tiny island, just a causeway off Saudi Arabia, but where is the call for the king of Bahrein and the wicked Saud family to yield to the legitimate rebels? Why is there a no fly Zone over Arabia? For the same reason that Bush chose to bomb Iraq as punishment of the Moslems for the 9/11 attacks, even though the 9/11 bombers were almost entirely Saudi terrorists, not Iraqi terrorists—Osama bin Laden is a Saudi. But the Saudi’s are chums of the west, specifically of the Bush family, it was said at the time. There can be no one with a brain cell today who does not know this, but sadly our cynical rulers know full well that there is nothing easier than for the minority to rule the majority. Just use media manipulation.

In the UK, before the war in Iraq, a million people turned out against the war. It woke up the British ruling class and their media pals to the need for continuous propaganda, so a campaign began that is continuing still. Almost the only history taught in British schools these days is Hitler and WWII, the way our “brave boys” beat the Nazis. They were indeed brave boys… then… fighting against a right wing racist dictatorship that wanted to control the world from Europe to India, and most of them conscripted, not professional soldiers, but it gets our youth admiring warfare, and imagining that we only fight just wars—now a big lie.

Our “brave boys” today are more like the Nazis, fighting against poor foreigners thousands of miles away who just want to live their own lives. But the propaganda in the last decade has worked, and these—our own soldiers—though they are killing farmers and their families trying to wrest back the control of their own land from foreigners, are hailed as heroes! Well, they are called that when they return in a box, or with bits of themselves missing. In the UK a charity was set up for these heroes called, would you believe, “Help the Heroes”, when the people helping could have been more help marching in an angry mass to stop these boys, and girls, from wasting their lives for no good reason. Helping rich men grab someone else’s resources, mainly oil not carrots, is not heroic. They do not differ from heavies working for gangsters, except that the heavies know what they are doing, and do it for profit, while our soldiers are paid little more than KPs.

We can always afford a good war!

Now the Queen has given the little Wiltshire town of Wootton Basset the accolade of “Royal” because it hosted a regular mass line up of people grieving for the victims as each one, returned to Lineham air base, proceeded in a funeral procession through the town. Some will have grieved genuinely. But how much more valuable it would have been if they had instead been protesting against the war. Instead it became a neo Nazi showcase of tattooed bikers, war veterans who ought to have known better, various other rentacrowd types, and, of course, BBC and Murdoch’s TV camera men duly filming it several times a week, for its propaganda value. The town naturally loved it—business had never been better.

Now we learn that with the launch of the war against Libya, another propaganda charity has started, “Horses for Heroes”, in which disabled soldiers are riding from John o’Groats at the tip of Scotland to Land’s End at the tip of Cornwall, around 1000 miles, nominally to raise money, but, in fact, like “Help the Heroes”, to continue the war sympathy campaign on the British people. The UK is now like the US. It is on a permanent war economy, and even the media have to show some people, even veterans, saying so, and criticizing the hysteria for war sentiment. These wise people ask:

How can we afford these wars when we are bankrupt, and ordinary people are feeling the weight of government cuts through pay freezes and tax hikes. How can money be found, in these allegedly dire circumstances, for stupid overseas adventures which are of no concern for us.

The megarich financier class gets richer while ordinary people get poorer. The megarich, investment capitalists and bankers, get bailed out by poor people’s sacrifices, and arms dealers get rich by killing the poor, here allegedly being heroes, and abroad by being evil cowards blowing up our heroes to defend their land and homes. All is fair in war, as far as the rich are concerned, providing that the profits roll in. I wonder what they would do if we rebelled. Would they shoot rebels? It is what they have usually done. Does anyone seriously think they are different now?

Education not Poverty—Reclaiming What is Ours!

In the 2007, Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study test, students from Singapore took first or second place in all science categories. The United States ranked 11th.

The quality of our math and science education lags behind many other nations.

Barack Obama

Mark Roth, a former science editor of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette asks why do pupils, in a nation that is world leader in scientific research lag, behind other countries in science. Excuses range from poverty, poor training of teachers, disdainful attitudes to education and knowledge, the shockingly poor scientific illiteracy of American adults to the convenience of paying to import scientists and mathematicians from abroad where standards are higher. It is is actually cheaper for corporations to hire foreign scientists that for have to pay taxes to improve the US education service.

Meanwhile, the huge gap between students in affluent and poor school districts is reflected in racial disparities in scores. Affluent white kids in the US do as well as white kids in Europe. In the European Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA, American students as a whole scored 502 in 2009, slightly above the industrialized nation average of 500. Arthur Eisenkraft, a science education expert at the University of Massachusetts at Boston, said economic differences play a part in the discrepancy:

We’ve always known there are high correlations between poverty and how kids do in school.

The downside is particularly noticeable in large urban school districts like Pittsburgh. Only two of the 17 big city school districts that participated in the National Assessment of Educational Progress science tests, in 2009, had more than a third of their students scoring in the proficient range. Eight of the districts had more than half of their students below the basic level. Alan J Friedman, a science education consultant, emphasized that those who are below basic in science at the eighth grade level most probably will be freezing themselves out of a whole lifetime of advancement opportunities.

Part of the reason for the fall in test scores from the elementary school to middle school is attitude—and is shared by parents as well as kids. In Asian countries, doing well in science is considered to be by application, hard work, but Americans think it is whether you have a natural gift for a subject, aptitude, natural ability—you just don’t want to do it! Students say, “I’m no good at science, and that’s just how it is”. Being a “celebrity” seems a lot more fun!

Besides the need for effort, school pupils need to know how to analyze problems and work out the answers to them. But many teachers who teach science are poorly trained in it themselves. Many have not done science in college. It becomes particularly critical if the content is controversial, as in teaching evolution in biology classes. Lack of the proper training in science and evolution leaves teachers without the confidence to face up to aggressive Christian kids challenging them, especially when they have equally aggressive and sometimes influential parents coming into the school to complain. Many parents love Jesus so much that they love guns, and high school shootings have become popular recently.

The lack of scientific literacy in America is compounded by the determination of many US Christians no keep on sabotaging science on the grounds that all the answers necessary are in Genesis. All Genesis answers is what is in it, and whatever regard people have for it, it is not science.

Ultimately America, and much of the west—the UK is going the same way—needs proper regulation of corporate greed. If people are to work hard, they need rewards that seem proportionate—decent wages, apprenticeships and training schemes, and sposorship of education—but corporate America could not care less than it does about American society. If they could get people to work for nothing they would, and when industry is fully robotized, that will be the real situation.

But who then would be able to buy anything? Without money at the base of society, at consumer level, society collapses, and discontent rises. Intelligent young people already see it, experience it, and feel that education is pointless when the prospect of any work for most is negligible. Already there are places where hundreds of people compete for each job that becomes available. They wonder whether it is lucky or clever to take any such job, if offered, because they will have to work for peanuts under a perpetual threat of being fired. Why bother? It is easier and more lucrative to be a thief. Already vast swathes of the inner cities are dying or dead, because industries have moved to cheap labor countries, or to another state in the Union that will offer the biggest incentives—bribes.

Social responsibility has to be made an important factor in corporate decisions. It can be done by strictly enforced legislation. And should the corporate bosses decide to move abroad, then they should do it with the knowledge that their products will be heavily taxed if they are imported to the USA, and Americans domiciled abroad whose businesses have been moved from the USA, should be taxed as if they still lived in the USA. It is time the country was taking back what it has allowed a small body of people to take away—the nation’s jobs and wages.