The Decline of US Education, Innovation and Technology

Table of Contents

Introduction3

Decline of US Education since World War 25

Not-for-Profit Colleges and Universities6

For-Profit Colleges and Universities7

Decline of US Innovation since World War 29

Decline of US Technology since World War 211

Conclusion13

References15

The Decline of US Education, Innovation and Technology

Introduction

Education is the engine of social mobility, and patina. The Americans have two options: improve their educational system, or accept a lower standard of living. Because of its ability to continuously renew the foundations of industrial development, technological innovation is a key element of dynamism in Western economies. The current power of the United States rests on a particularly strong structural propensity of American capitalism to generate technological innovation, as exploited in industry than in the field of armaments. At; As such, technological innovation is seen as a central factor in the historical construction of the U.S. strategic and economic power.

Various researches provide a succinct and insightful analysis of relative US decline. They argue that US technological dominance in the immediate post World War II period had two components: a lead in mass-production industries that was of long standing and a newer dominance of high-technology industries. The technological gap is measured by the difference between the level of technology embodied in the capital stock of “follower” countries and the technological “leader”. The central insight is that the productivity growth of the leader is limited to the growth in knowledge during the interval between installations of new vintages of the capital stock, whereas follower countries can potentially make a greater leap in productivity and growth by replacing their older capital stock with state-of-the-art technology used by the leader (Chesbrough, 2003).

Abramowitz argues that in the post World War II period, three factors came together to sustain a successful catch-up drive by follower countries towards US levels of productivity. These were the presence of large technological gaps between European states and Japan vis-à-vis the US; enlarged social competence in follower countries as reflected in higher levels of education and institutional development; and the existence of conditions favoring the rapid realization of catch-up potential (including political reform, an opening of international markets, and an improved diffusion of technology). The more rapid increase in productivity growth rates and the consequent higher growth rates in output implied a narrowing gap between the “follower” countries and the US. Many frameworks has proved popular for analyzing the relative decline of the US economy in the post World War II period (and for other historical episodes of “catch-up”) and has served as the basis for numerous refinements (Richard, 1991).

The decline actually began shortly after World War II, the U.S. power is then at its peak, the fine rhetoric and triumphalism of the 1990s more to do with self-satisfaction. Recognizing the existence of a decline in education services provided to students in the United States during the past years, and its impact negatively on the level of scientific research in the country, putting both U.S. presidential candidate's plans and proposals to improve education and promote ...