Book Reviews: America’s Future
By Noel Agnew
Good government requires foresight – looking into the future. Apparently not a lot of that went on as we careered into financial meltdown. So where will America be in 50 or 100 years from now? Authors have been keen to weigh in on our future prospects, especially in terms of the economy, population growth, and security.
In his new book The Next Hundred Million: America in 2050, Joel Kotkin says that there will be 400 million people in America by 2050, so we better get used to the idea. This book, however, does not forecast gloomy conditions with cities bursting at the seams and lack of job opportunities.
Instead Kotkin sees a bright future, with more and more people settling outside expensive cities like New York and Chicago, residing in metropolitan areas where new living space still exists, such as Houston and Phoenix. Suburbs will also thrive and many more people will work from home, reducing the nation’s carbon footprint. Cultural diversity and productivity will increase hand-in-hand. When we arrive at this situation in 40 years, argues Kotkin, the US will be the undisputed economic king, with few competitors for Her crown.
While Kotkin sees immigration as the force behind a flourishing economy, author Frosty Wooldridge warns of the misery of over-population in his book America on the Brink: The Next Added 100 Million Americans. Acording to Woolridge, we will have another 100 million people even sooner, by 2035 in fact. Water shortages, gridlock and rising pollution will all result, threatening the existence of the American dream, even our civilization.
On security matters, we can look even further into the future with George Friedman’s The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century. This is a fascinating account of possible conflicts around the globe as the century unfolds. The good news for America is that it will dominate the landscape, argues Friedman, easily overcoming the Islamic terror threats that occupy us today. Friedman, founder of Stratfor, an independent geopolitical forecasting company, goes on to describe a space war against Japan and Turkey in 2050, and border clashes with Mexico in the 2080s. Fantastical? Possible? At least one thing does seem certain: people love to look into a possible future. Now if only we could plan for it too…
