Is the US really in decline?

The US can't address its issues without creating further contradictions. I think the biggest success they've had is definitely sucking Europe dry, but that's just kicking the can down the road really. Domestically, conditions continue to decline at an accelerating rate. There is no plan to address this. That's a major contradiction right there. When the next major crisis happens, who are they gonna steal from? I feel like if they had to turn to other countries in the imperial core for wealth extraction, doesn't that say a lot about the long-term viability of their economy? How will Europe function as they decline from relative prosperity into a hellhole similar to modern America? Will people take it lying down? People in the global south have also definitely taken notice of the Ukraine war and how weak America actually is at defending its interests militarily. Can the US prevent the decolonization of West Africa and the Middle East forever? Will bigger holes start to form in South America or other parts of the world?

The US has definitely taken notice of the seeds of its destruction i.e. de-dollarization and growing Chinese and Eurasian hegemony and taken some measures to address this. However, the contradictions of neoliberalism and financialization have not changed. There is nothing they can do to change them. The death of the U.S. is a process that will take some time and there will be ebbs and flows. Unfortunately, even 100 years is a relatively short period of time in terms of human development, so we could go our whole lifetime without seeing America destroyed even if we can see its inevitability. Also, economic indicators are essentially religious divinations designed to prop up the system, so unless it's coming from a Marxist or at least some non-mainstream source they really can't be taken at face value.

After the cold war, the US was the one uncontested world power and they could basically do whatever they wanted with impunity. This is not the reality anymore. China is NOT stumbling, it's just USian cope that they've been spouting for years ("their growth is fake! Building railroads is a bad economic choice! They're gonna collapse this year trust me bro"), they're the second biggest world economy and a genuine competing world power. The Ukrainian war is also proving that challenging the US is possible; it was a spit in the face of NATO and the US regardless if you think what Putin did was justified or not, and Russia basically just got away with it. The US is still a powerful empire, but you have to put things in context to what they were like just a few years ago.

The big problem US has is with private debt. 57% of Americans can't afford a $1,000 unexpected expense. There are jaw dropping numbers of people in debt, and people are increasingly using credit for essentials.

First problem here is that people living on the margins don't have sufficient income for discretionary spending, and that means companies start losing customers which makes their revenue drops. This in turn leads to companies doing layoffs which further feeds into the worsening economic situation.

Second problem is that debt is an assets from the perspective of the lenders. When people and companies aren't able to service their debts that ends up creating losses for the debt holders. Current situation of people going further and further into debt will eventually result in a debt crisis.

There's a great interview with Michael Hudson where he discusses this problem https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/06/michael-hudson-on-the-us-economy-surprisingly-resilient-or-potemkin-village.html

Money grows on trees in North America, but who waters them? The global periphery.

What is sending shockwaves through the neocolonial financial system that maintains the imperial extraction headed to the US, Canada, Aus, Europe, Japan, & South Korea is not just COVID itself but the lack of confidence inspired by the shock from COVID, the US reaction, the failed Russian sanctions, proxy war between Europe and the US in Ukraine (yes I wrote that correctly), and the failed sanctions waves against China, and there is no turning back.

The US is now locked in a struggle against a development model that is cozying up to Taiwan, occupied Korea, and Europe, and we don't know what the fuck to do. So we're lashing out at them to try to hit the snooze button. Kick away Europe's cheap Russian oil pipelines so they're hooked on our LNG too.

What would have to be turned back to fix the US economy is the development of poorer countries. What will accelerate the process is the creation of new financial systems, international bodies to replace the function of the IMF, more bilateral agreements and trade (African countries mostly trade with non-African countries 😔), waiting to see the New Development Bank really get into gear or stuff like it.

This series of talks has covered this subject starting before WWII.

Is it over yet? Reports of the death of neoliberalism are once again proliferating. (transcript in body)

https://hexbear.net/post/1360680

I'm not in a place to give a thorough response with high quality sources, so I apologize ahead of time for this. But let me break down my thoughts in a quick manner.

I'm not sure where you live, but regular people in the US do not feel what supposedly is on paper the positive economic effects that are taking shape currently. I'm not sure where those numbers exactly come from, but the vast majority of people have had raises, but their expenses have gone up further than their raises. On average, people are not feeling the bounce-back effects of the economy yet.

Unemployment is still high because they fudge the numbers with gig economy stuff. As well, unemployment only counts the people who are looking for work, and a bunch of people have just straight up stopped looking. I've never really trusted those numbers anyway. That being said, if unemployment is low, that's actually bad for capitalism. If unemployment is high, that means that they can drive down salaries. Trust me, as of right now, people are still competing for the same jobs.

I'll also make a general note here. All you're talking about is economic factors. But economic factors is just GDP and stock prices, and shit for rich people. None of this really affects normal people, except for the unemployment rate.

No notes on energy, but the United States is pretty powerful and has a lot of control over energy anyway, so that's not surprising.

Regarding infrastructure, I believe according to experts, and this is where I don't have sources, sorry about that. We only funded the infrastructure needs by about 25%. We barely stopped the bleeding. The infrastructure costs are going to rear their ugly head in less than 10 years again. At that point in time, they'll be twice as bad. This is literally the definition of short term gain, but long term loss. We aren't doing anything to fundamentally change our system.

The United States does not put a lot of money into foreign wars like Ukraine or Israel. So I agree it's not a good indicator of the United States Being weak or anything. But it's also not news. This isn't anything different or significant.

China's economy is not stumbling. That's pretty much just propaganda. Their unemployment rate is not high. They actually pay kids to stay at home and take care of families. In situations that the United States does not recognize as employment, and so they count that as unemployment. China's unemployment is actually way lower than it looks to the United States propagandists.

I've also never seen anybody spin lower interest rates to be a bad thing, so I guess congratulations?

In terms of foreign trade, this is the thing I'm the least knowledgeable about. So I don't have any specific notes here except to say that short-term gain and long-term loss is probably added again.

I'll tell you who actually does care about the United States handling of COVID. All those people that lost their family members. Also, even people in China can recognize that they probably held on to the new COVID policy for too long. But it beats losing a million people. Again, short term gain and long term loss. In the end, what China did is way better than what the US did, Even if there were some compromises that were reasonable on both sides.

Also, I don't entirely understand people only comparing the United States to China. I mean, the fact of the matter is that the United States is absorbing the economic output of many other countries as well. You kind of want to look at how those countries are faring as well as the United States in order to understand the full economic output. And although they get a lot of stuff from China, the other countries they're going from are not doing so well. The fact of the matter is that China makes most of the stuff that it uses and so their economic system is a lot more. How do you say full circle? So, in theory, if any one part of their economy is doing bad, it shows. Whereas, if some country that the United States oppresses is doing poorly, that doesn't actually reflect on the United States. Think of it this way. There's only 330 million people in the United States, and they're pretty much the richest people on earth. So don't compare the 330 million people and the United States to the 1.4 billion people in China. Compare the 330 million people in the United States to the richest 330 million people in China. China is doing much better than the United States if you compare it that way.

But even then, why are we constantly comparing the economic output of the United States to China? The fact of the matter is that material condition matters much more for the longevity of a country than anything else. Who the fuck cares what the interest rate is this year? Who the fuck cares whether or not China has lower unemployment this month? The United States is a time bomb waiting to explode. China is at least a lot more stable than that.

The Chinese economy stuff is pretty exaggerated. Yes they're facing issues but the Western press does this all the time. I've been reading about China's economy suffering since the 90's.

American infrastructure packages sure as hell don't look like they paid off that much when I last went. Looked just as rundown and in repair as it did when I lived there 20 years ago.

I don't have a whole lot of time to go over every point made in detail, but I do think US is in a decline. But it's a slow decline and I don't think the country will ever collapse. The more likely outcome is that the world becomes increasingly multipolar. China was the first to challenge the unipolarity of the US and others will follow.

Interest rates are about 3.5% in China while they’re about 5% in the US, which means China has less room to perform expansionary monetary policy than the US.

No, that means China has more room to perform QE. Interests rates must lag inflation. Target interest rates are 2%, and QE causes inflation and interest rates must rise as a response, generally. (With a few caveats) China also has a healthier debt to gdp ratio than the US. But Chances are they won’t raise their debt ceiling.

The US is objectively in decline.

The rise of multipolarity is a clear sign of failed foreign policy, the rise of internal fascism+homelessness is a clear sign of worsening of material conditions for US citizens, the rise of "21th century socialism" in latin america is also a sign of failed foreign policy.

Empires do not simply collapse out of nowhere, it is an historic process where small quantitative losses lead to qualitative changes like the examples i mentioned.

30 years ago when the USSR was dismantled, the US seemed unstoppable and was even declared the end of history, yet here we are. The US will score victories here and there, but the sum indicates that the US is in decline objectively in my opinion.

Decline is inevitable if history is considered proof, however history demonstrates the death of empires takes many generations, in some cases, hundreds of years. So, while it may be declining, it doesn't mean it's going to be gone in five years, it will likely take decades.

It can be hard to predict the flow of things. The USSR appeared to be in very strong position in the late 1970s and then everything went to shit within a decade. The same can easily happen to the US if they continue to unsustainably cannibalize their vassals and fail to get a grip on their rising debt.

Yes. Compare how many countries joined the US-led alliance against Yemen vs. how many joined the US-led alliance against Iraq.

There’s also de-dollarization in the Arabian Gulf https://www.iiss.org/sv/publications/strategic-comments/2023/the-state-of-de-dollarisation-in-the-gulf-region/

Of course being in decline doesn’t mean it will collapse within our lifetime. Just the end of it being the sole superpower.

I agree on certain points and disagree on others.

Yes, China's economy's not doing well, and they are spending less on BRI. Thankfully DFC is not actually picking up the slack and eating China's lunch due to structural reasons, but Chinese influence is lesser than before. This is only heightened by China's refusal to apply real pressure or voice for geopolitically hot topics such as the wars in Donbass and Gaza. I can't blame them being passive as there will be a harsh reaction if they do act.

I fundamentally disagree on American economic indicators. Labor participation rate still hasn't reached pre-pandemic levels although it is rising. The American economy is definitely generating more dollars, but that is different from livability. Surveys reveal that Americans are feeling financially insecure on a personal level. Cost of essential goods such as food, transportation (cars), and housing (rent or mortgage) has outpaced wage increases for all but the top 1%. Even those who are making over $100,000 a year are feeling the pressure. I do admit that energy/fuel prices have gone down a lot which is positive.

The real workhorses of the American empire - Japan, S. Korea and Germany - are being hollowed out heavily, and that will diminish American power. When truly parasitic states such as Spain and Australia suffer, it doesn't affect America much. It's a different matter when it comes to technological and industrial powerhouses as they enable America to continue its lead over core technologies and its processes.

My view of the world is that it's not zero-sum in most respects. China's doing bad, but so are America and her allies. The world is simply in a degenerative state at the moment.

Regarding friendshoring, Kissinger had said that it’s fatal to be America’s ally.

The US economy is doing well, almost to the point where the US can start to raise interest rates to fight inflation.

But the whole world, excluding the eurozone because of energy, is doing well. If this continues, pushing imperialism onto the eurozone becomes an option for the US.

I don't disagree with others who point out how US power has declined from its peak of complete hegemony after 1992 but we're not presently at or soon to be at a world really any worse than the one that existed at the height of the cold war and the US won that one as we know.

Never forget though we see internal divisions and cracks in the US now, that in the 60s there were many genuine leftist militant movements which were systemically crushed and destroyed not to mention the fear was such that they killed a sitting president, assassinated civil rights leaders, etc. Never forget despite the media hype that Jan 6 was a fizzling dud, that it was mostly just angry entitled older whites who had no real game plan, no weapons, and most likely no intent to do anything beyond disrupting the certification by shouting and shoving and declaring themselves in control without any plans to do anything further.

Point is I suppose the US has been in tough spots before as has international finance capital and they've managed to engineer ways out of various problems we've predicted they'd encounter. Much as I want to, I don't think we should count them out and count on some inertia to destroy them just because they're facing headwinds and problems right now as China is also facing issues here and there.

For the moment the global south has the initiative and momentum with African nations kicking out France, Russia beating western sanctions, etc. But that too has happened in the past. Look how many revolutionary movements existed, the developments and progress that seemed to be happening in the global south in say the 1950s through 1960s and how they were ultimately mostly crushed by the 70s aside from a revolution in Cuba, the partial success of the revolution in Korea, etc. How US intelligence with help from comprador local capitalists, warlords, corrupt military officials, and European efforts subverted revolutionary movements, defeated them, installed comprador regimes or in cases like South America installed fascist dictators.

We're a long ways from winning and I think a lot of left/Marxist spirit was hurt or crushed by thinking the same things last century and then seeing it all go to pieces. Going from being positive of the certainty of victory and elevated and enthralled by our minor successes to being crushed by the staggering defeat we were handed and the collapse and couping of the USSR that capped it all off.

While we could yet see a decades happening in weeks situation in the west and things could rapidly spiral the way of a decline and balkanization, we can't count on it. Most likely, rationally, the west will continue to exist and be a threat for decades to come and it could be a century. If China can hold out, stay strong and avoid being isolated from the international economy (avoid the BRI being undermined by coups, compradors, etc) as the USSR was through 2030-2040 they'll be in a much stronger position than the USSR ever was at any point IMO.

People have mentioned the actual economic situation for your average worker in the west has gotten worse despite the economy doing better and this is true. But the west has had periods of great pain for the working classes in the past and they haven't enacted revolution at those points and won't do so this time I think either. Not unless the pain really spirals and remains so for more than 20 years IMO. I mean more than just a reduction of living quality, quality of life and buying power for the youth. I think the youth will take that, grumble about it, dislike it but still be too propagandized and not uncomfortable enough to actually revolt or do anything that threatens the western system or governments.

US is in fact moving ahead with de-coupling or "de-risking" as they've branded it. Something many in the western left laughed at 6 years ago as doomed to humiliating failure.

Yes in economically but its a long way to go , atleast more 50 yrs.