Marc FreyOur will, our patience and our pocketbooks will get tested in ways we have not experienced in a very long time, but if you believe in the fundamentals that I have outlined, you will understand that your hope for better days ahead are well founded.

As the stiff breeze of a difficult economy is blowing hard in our faces, it is becoming increasingly more difficult to stay positive.

One of my recipes in a situation like this is to put things into perspective and therefore it would be a good moment for us to remember what makes this nation great in the first place, so that we can understand the fundamental forces that are in play which will drive us toward a better economic futur:

  • Population growth. We are currently growingat an estimated 1.3 percent rate, which translates into 4 million new consumers every year. This is an important fact because it adds positive momentum to the economy as a whole and is in sharp contrast to the nonexisting population growth in Japan and Europe. Not only are we growing, but we have the ability to accommodate our current growth rate for many more decades.
  • Natural resources. Land, water, timber, the largest coal reserves, natural gas, and many minerals. Often we take this for granted, but it is an important undamental factor and again in contrast of many other leading countries that are not as blessed as we are.
  • Infrastructure. No economy can grow without a good infrastructure. Ours is vast (did you know that there are 14,000 airports in the USA of which 5,000 are paved?), adaptable and able to grow. We don’t often think about it, but anybody having worked abroad knows how well we would do in an international comparison. There is a reason why BMW is building cars in South Carolina.
  • Work force. We don’t give ourselves enough credit. The American work force is ready, willing and capable. The reason U.S. auto manufacturers are in trouble has nothing to do with the work force, as is evidenced that Japan’s most profitable plants are on our soil.
  • Smarts. There has been so much talk about how smart Asian youth are and how a new generation of Indian workers is so capable of processing complex data, that sometimes we forget that the USA has by far the most and best funded universities. As a result we are continuing to lead in technological advancements, in arts, in educating future entrepreneurs and generally preparing a new generation to find solutions to the challenges ahead of us. Need proof? Of 303 Nobel Prizes awarded in the last 25 years, the USA won 143 of them, followed by Germany, with 25; the UK, with 20; France, with 13; Japan, with 11; and Canada; with 10; all other countries won fewer than 10 prizes including Russia, with four; China, with two; and India, with two (go to www.hiltonheadmonthly.com/noble to see a complete list).
  • Technology. For good or for worse nothing has shaped society’s more than technological advances and is reason why we were able to transit from an agricultural, to an industrial to knowledge based society, every time raising the standard of living for the majority of people. The USA will be on the forefront of pushing the world to the next frontier whether it is through nanotechnology or any of the other exciting new discoveries waiting to be implemented on a practical level creating new wealth.
  • Energy independence is not a reality now and is in fact our Achilles heel, but if our industries and the government would coordinate their road map, we could greatly reduce our dependence over the next decade, which would reverse the nation’s fortune like no other single thing we could do. It will happen — it is just unclear how fast and how big the impact is going to be, (more on this subject in a future column).
  • Flexibility. Jobs are being lost and jobs are being created at a moment’s notice. While the personal experience can be emotionally challenging, it is important to understand that no other industrialized nation is as agile as we are. Because of this willingness to continually adapt to new situations, we are capable of absorbing a decline, but also rapidly accelerate as new opportunities arise and as a result we will be the first nation to come out of the world recession.
  • The American Dream. Finally and most importantly we are a nation that continually looks toward the future, is eager to “make it happen” and this eternally optimistic outlook is at the very core of our economic engine.

Our will, our patience and our pocketbooks will get tested in ways we have not experienced in a very long time, but if you believe in the fundamentals that I have outlined, you will understand that your hope for better days ahead are well founded.

Please e-mail me reactions to this column and ideas that you might want to explore in future issues at marc@hiltonheadmonthly.com, or go to my blog at www.hiltonheadmonthly.com/lastcall and post your comment directly.