Is the U.S. Economy Still the Largest and Most Technologically Powerful?

[hitssquad]

The 2005 edition of the CIA World Factbook has recently been released.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

The U.S. economy is still listed as "the largest and most technologically powerful economy in the world," but the Factbook shows it has boomed to a total of ~12 trillion dollars and a per-capita GDP of $40,100.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html#Econ

Only Luxembourg — a small, financial-services economy — is listed as having a higher per-capita GDP.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rankorder/2004rank.html

 

[Pengwuino]

Whys the CIA world factbook so popular in discussions on both sides? Seems like the CIA woudl be the last source of information for some people on this forum...

 

[whozum]

Or the world for that matter.

 

[hitssquad]

I think it is because the CIA compiles the Factbook from independent sources and therefore has nothing to do with creation of the raw data. It simply serves as a handy compendium of national data and rankings.

 

[Art]

I think it is because the CIA compiles the Factbook from independent sources and therefore has nothing to do with creation of the raw data. It simply serves as a handy compendium of national data and rankings.

Still puzzled where they optained their data for India's GDP of $3,100 vs the Indian gvts $600 per capita on the earlier thread

 

[hitssquad]

The $3,100 is from the GDP-PPP method. The ~$600 is from the GDP-CER method.

 

[Big Papa]

CIA not as informed as Norm Chomski

Radio Free Maine is the placeto find the most informed stuff over the CIA. The CIA gets it's stuff in bulk. People like Norm Chomski get people from all around the world to send pacific newspaper articles and then he tell s the truth.

 

[loseyourname]

Yet he can't seem to get the truth out about how his name is spelled.

 

[Art]

Radio Free Maine is the placeto find the most informed stuff over the CIA. The CIA gets it's stuff in bulk. People like Norm Chomski get people from all around the world to send pacific newspaper articles and then he tell s the truth.

Just curious but was Maine really a former penal colony as you mentioned in another thread?

 

[Big Papa]

who cares

Who cares if my spelling is bad? That doesn't mean what I type isn't true. What are you some sort of Jerk who has to think if someone mispells they aren't telling the truth? You need to conduct historical research before calling other people liars. I've spent years studying so much infomation I'm not going to waste time trying to get the exact spelling correct just so you can say, " Oh he must be telling the truth because his grammar is 100% correct!" Howard Zinn. How is that? I spelled his name right. So am I wrong about Norm but right on Howard Zinn? By the way Roger Liesner who video tapes Norm lives right here in Augusta, So it's not like I don't get the video tapes hot off the press.


AS for the other gentleman yes Maine used to be a penal colony. During the French and Indian war or the seven years war, French prisoners were incarerated here. Then people from England came over for the same thing. Like up in Presque Isle or around there there is a town that is full of Daigle's. In Jefferson it's Peaslee or Peasle ( two brothers got into a fight and one changed his name.) Brann and etc. It's like people are so affraid to fight each other because if someone gets killed at the funnel the other relatives are like,"You killed the wrong cousin and it doesn't matter if you didn't know then you were related!" When Massachusetts owned this area, it was still a penal colony. AFter it became a State it had over 60 mental institutions. So when people found out someone was Gay they sent them to Maine. Augusta just built a huge Mental hospital that according to nurses is like a 5 star hotel.
The grounds of the Former mental hospital, next door is huge. It also used to be an Arsenal. So yeah, all the decendents of all the penal residents, the mental cases, the gay people all intermixed and throughout the generations came out a certain breed. That's why they hate people from out of state like myself. I've been here since 1991 and people still have not considered be a Mainer, but a "M*******." In fact after the Ameriocan Revolutionary war, not all those loyal to the crown when to Canada. Like Mc Cain bought up potato fields. Then expanded out to other States (with Mc Cain french fries, does that sound familiar.) So we in fact have a caste system in place. Then we still have people that talk with the thick accent. You know it sounds like a cross between old english and someone talking with food in their mouth. So yes Maine used to be a penal colony, and today only has a population of 1.2 million people. But at least a person can rent a room for $80 a week in the capital and go to college for really cheap.

 

[Art]

Thanks for the information Big Papa.. It's interesting. I believe Stephen King sets a lot of his horror stories around Maine so when you mentioned it was a former penal colony and home for the insane I wondered if that was where he got his inspiration from.

 

[Big Papa]

actually it's funny you mentioned mr.King. The president of Maccomber FArr and Whitten Insurance on One Market place in Downtown Augusta was college roomates with King. In fact His name is John Finnagan. King used his name in the book the Stand. He made him out to be a hydro plant engineer I think. It was something like that. He can get away with that because John Finnagan doesn't know anything about that stuff. He and his twin brother who is he head of the Maine Stae housing Authority play in a band called HillBrook. ( They got the name from passinga senior citizens home somewhere when debating the name of the band.) They are always booked up straight thru the Summer. So like King they both play musical instruments. King was always a writer but I won't tell you what type of stuff he wrote to help pay his way in College!

 

[loseyourname]

Who cares if my spelling is bad? That doesn't mean what I type isn't true. What are you some sort of Jerk who has to think if someone mispells they aren't telling the truth?

Come on, it was funny. I made no evaluation of the truth of your claims. Still, his name is Noam, not Norm. If you lightened up for half a second, I'm sure you'd find that funny.

 

[GENIERE]

Following Big Papa's logic, Australia must have an insane number of mental institutions, although...

Maine’s continuing leftward drift makes me sense a correlation with socialism. I wonder what the per capita number of asylums in France, Germany, and Sweden is as compared to… Texas? Perhaps the number of psychoanalysts would be a better indicator? Is depression a liberal thing or does it also occur in the normal individual? Can we replace polling data with inkblot tests?


...

 

[hitssquad]

The universal acceptance of the CIA World Factbook as reliable

Radio Free Maine is the placeto find the most informed stuff over the CIA. The CIA gets it's stuff in bulk. People like Norm Chomski get people from all around the world to send pacific newspaper articles and then he tell s the truth.

The World Factbook is not same thing as the CIA. The World Factbook is in competition with neither Radio Free Maine nor Noam Chomsky. The World Factbook is well-known as a source of raw data used by countless American leftwing political activists including communist professors and communist grad students of sociology and anthropology. If you ask Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, they will undoubtedly both affirm that they study the World Factbook, trust it, and use it as a source for figures in their analyses.


Did you know that The Northern Virginia Green Party recommends that people use the Cia World Factbook as a reference?
http://novagreens.org/resources.html


--
Online Information Sources
[...]
CIA World Factbook
--


The Montgomery County Green Party also uses it as a source for data:
http://www.zounds.net/greens/MCGreens_Iraq.html

--
All other data (except where noted) from the CIA World Factbook.
--

 

[Pengwuino]

How does a little fact book with population numbers and land area become a political spin tool lol. Guess ill have to look at it a lil more

 

[Pengwuino]

Is depression a liberal thing or does it also occur in the normal individual?

We republicans call it not having enough firearms! Some, more serious cases of depression however, are called being a pansy.

 

[Pengwuino]

Radio Free Maine is the placeto find the most informed stuff over the CIA. The CIA gets it's stuff in bulk. People like Norm Chomski get people from all around the world to send pacific newspaper articles and then he tell s the truth.

Just to make a note, you assume the CIA lies and assume this Chomski individual tells the truth. Saying he gets his information from specific newspaper articles from unevaluated sources does not mean he's telling the truth.

 

[Art]

Big Papa I read the Stand years ago and thought the first 3/4 of the book was excellent. The last quarter was disappointing. It was almost as if King was rushing it to meet a deadline. With regard to comments following your earlier post I believe the compulsion to correct people on irrelevant points of fact, grammar or spelling is a symptom of Asperger's syndrome? I think I spelled it correctly

 

[Art]

Following Big Papa's logic, Australia must have an insane number of mental institutions, although...

1 in 5 people in Australia 18 years or older meet a criteria for a mental disorder

http://www.mhca.com.au/Public/AboutMentalHealth/Statistics.html

Maine’s continuing leftward drift makes me sense a correlation with socialism. I wonder what the per capita number of asylums in France, Germany, and Sweden is as compared to… Texas? Perhaps the number of psychoanalysts would be a better indicator? Is depression a liberal thing or does it also occur in the normal individual? Can we replace polling data with inkblot tests?

I'm not sure that a comparison of per capita / asylums would be valid because according to this report linked below a lot of the insane in Texas are incarcerated in the penal system rather than treated in asylums. http://www.mhatexas.org/FullHoggReport
As for depression in liberals, I believe there is a direct correlation between the election of a Republican government and the incidence of depression in liberals. Further research will probably show a corresponding inverse relationship for Republicans when a Democrat sits in the Whitehouse.

 

[Pengwuino]

As for depression in liberals, I believe there is a direct correlation between the election of a Republican government and the incidence of depression in liberals.

Thats sadly funny because i know too many liberals that are depressed. Half of me wants to laugh at them, the other half wants to know how pathetic is their life if what has the most bearing on their emotions is a president a few thousand miles away in washington.

 

[Art]

The World Factbook is not same thing as the CIA. The World Factbook is in competition with neither Radio Free Maine nor Noam Chomsky. The World Factbook is well-known as a source of raw data used by countless American leftwing political activists including communist professors and communist grad students of sociology and anthropology. If you ask Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, they will undoubtedly both affirm that they study the World Factbook, trust it, and use it as a source for figures in their analyses.


Did you know that The Northern Virginia Green Party recommends that people use the Cia World Factbook as a reference?
http://novagreens.org/resources.html--

I'd be careful using it if studying for a geography test. On the GDP ranking table the list is compiled supposedly by country but no'.s 3 and 5 Guernsey and Jersey are only small islands owned by England and no. 89 is a country called World.

 

[Art]

Thats sadly funny because i know too many liberals that are depressed. Half of me wants to laugh at them, the other half wants to know how pathetic is their life if what has the most bearing on their emotions is a president a few thousand miles away in washington.

Penqwuino it was meant to be a satirical comment

 

[GENIERE]

http://www.mhca.com.au/Public/AboutMentalHealth/Statistics.html

Australia is perplexing. The Liberal Party and the Labor party combine forces to elect the conservative John Howard. The real liberals, the Green Party acquired their skin color and sour disposition by sucking on eucalyptus leaves, a known antidepressent.

...

 

[Pengwuino]

I'd be careful using it if studying for a geography test. On the GDP ranking table the list is compiled supposedly by country but no'.s 3 and 5 Guernsey and Jersey are only small islands owned by England and no. 89 is a country called World.

Ah yes, World... a beautiful country with great tourist attractions and many magnificant beaches.

 

[SOS2008]

...I believe the compulsion to correct people on irrelevant points of fact, grammar or spelling is a symptom of Asperger's syndrome? I think I spelled it correctly

Or maybe it is forumannalitis?

I'm not sure that a comparison of per capita / asylums would be valid because according to this report linked below a lot of the insane in Texas are incarcerated in the penal system rather than treated in asylums.

A pretty high rate of executions too--that'll take care of the problem permanently.

As for depression in liberals, I believe there is a direct correlation between the election of a Republican government and the incidence of depression in liberals. Further research will probably show a corresponding inverse relationship for Republicans when a Democrat sits in the Whitehouse.

I doubt there's an inverse relationship, because one needs to have some level of spirituality toward the world to care enough. Republicans would just go on a shopping spree for guns, call a few people names like 'pansies,' and soon they'd feel much better.

 

[Smurf]

Yet he can't seem to get the truth out about how his name is spelled.

Nice. That made me laugh out loud.

 

[Smurf]

How does a little fact book with population numbers and land area become a political spin tool lol. Guess ill have to look at it a lil more

*sigh* let me explain. Everything in the world fact book is (more or less) factually correct and everyone agrees on it. Political Parties create political spin by taking the numbers they do like, and leaving out the ones they don't like. Or, if they don't like any of the numbers because it's so blatantly obvious they're doing a lousy job they change the subject to, i don't know, gay marriage or gun contro or some equivalent that they have a high ground on with the masses. You see, the masses are pretty stupid and will fall for that. That's political spin/tactic.

 

[BobG]

I'd be careful using it if studying for a geography test. On the GDP ranking table the list is compiled supposedly by country but no'.s 3 and 5 Guernsey and Jersey are only small islands owned by England and no. 89 is a country called World.

Actually, the list you're talking about is GDP per capita (per person). Using overall GDP, Jersey ranks 165th and Guernsey ranks 174th.

Guernsey only has 65,000 people (208th on the list) - there's more people at Nebraska football games than that. In fact, Guernsey County in Ohio has almost as many people as the Bailiwick of Guernsey (Guernsey County was established by migrants from the Bailiwick of Guernsey and still has a lot of Guernsey descendants). One nice thing about Guernsey - a professor did a detailed genealogy of Guernsey, so if you have ancestors from there, you can trace your lineage all the way back to the 1600's.

 

[Art]

Actually, the list you're talking about is GDP per capita (per person). Using overall GDP, Jersey ranks 165th and Guernsey ranks 174th.

Guernsey only has 65,000 people (208th on the list) - there's more people at Nebraska football games than that. In fact, Guernsey County in Ohio has almost as many people as the Bailiwick of Guernsey (Guernsey County was established by migrants from the Bailiwick of Guernsey and still has a lot of Guernsey descendants). One nice thing about Guernsey - a professor did a detailed genealogy of Guernsey, so if you have ancestors from there, you can trace your lineage all the way back to the 1600's.

I wasn't commenting on their rankings, the point I was making is they are not countries and neither is there a country called World

 

[hitssquad]

The practice of listing certain non-nations in the World Factbook

they are not countries and neither is there a country called World

The Factbook site says:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

--
Select a Country or Location
--


It also says:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/docs/faqs.html

--
Why are Taiwan and the European Union listed out of alphabetical order at the end of the Factbook entries?
[...]
The European Union (EU) is not a country, but it has taken on many nation-like attributes and these are likely to be expanded in the future. A more complete explanation on the inclusion of the EU into the Factbook may be found in the http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ee.html#Intro.
[...]
Why don’t you include information on entities such as Tibet, Kashmir, or Kosovo?
The World Factbook provides information on the administrative divisions of a country as recommended by the United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN). The BGN is a component of the US Government that develops policies, principles, and procedures governing the spelling, use, and application of geographic names—domestic, foreign, Antarctic, and undersea. Its decisions enable all departments and agencies of the US Government to have access to uniform names of geographic features.

Also included in the Factbook are entries on parts of the world whose status has not yet been resolved (e.g., West Bank, Spratly Islands).
--

 

[Art]

The Factbook site says:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

--
Select a Country or Location
--


It also says:
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/docs/faqs.html

--
Why are Taiwan and the European Union listed out of alphabetical order at the end of the Factbook entries?
[...]
The European Union (EU) is not a country, but it has taken on many nation-like attributes and these are likely to be expanded in the future. A more complete explanation on the inclusion of the EU into the Factbook may be found in the http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ee.html#Intro.
[...]
Why don’t you include information on entities such as Tibet, Kashmir, or Kosovo?
The World Factbook provides information on the administrative divisions of a country as recommended by the United States Board on Geographic Names (BGN). The BGN is a component of the US Government that develops policies, principles, and procedures governing the spelling, use, and application of geographic names—domestic, foreign, Antarctic, and undersea. Its decisions enable all departments and agencies of the US Government to have access to uniform names of geographic features.

Also included in the Factbook are entries on parts of the world whose status has not yet been resolved (e.g., West Bank, Spratly Islands).
--

I do not doubt there are probably zillions of accurate facts contained in this publication. I was merely pointing out that under a column header entitled COUNTRIES there were many entries which are clearly not countries. If they intentionally included past countries, regions which will become countries or regions that would like to be countries or even land masses on distant planets, I couldn't care less. The point remains they are not countries now and so the column heading is wrong.
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/rankorder/2001rank.html

 

[Andy]

Thats being abit picky though isn't it.

 

[Art]

Thats being a bit picky though isn't it.

I actually raised it as a humerous point initially but it seemed some folk took it as an affront to the CIA or whatever. :zzz:

 

[BobG]

How does a little fact book with population numbers and land area become a political spin tool lol. Guess ill have to look at it a lil more

Depends what other statistics you compare with it.

You can say Walmart is economically more powerful than Portugal, Norway, or Denmark ... or the Walmart annual sales would rank it the 36th richest nation in the world. Or you could downplay Walmart's power and mention that even Bengladesh's GDP is higher than Walmart's annual sales (not that there's anthing wrong with Bengladesh, but many Americans, at least, haven't even heard of Bengladesh ... or else they think it was George Harrison concert ).

And in regards to the quotation, "What's good for General Motors is good for America"? How so? Even Vietnam has a higher GDP than GM's annual revenues. Well okay, Vietnam has a higher GDP than Portugal, Norway, and Denmark, too, but it sounds good.

I actually raised it as a humerous point initially but it seemed some folk took it as an affront to the CIA or whatever.

No, I just didn't understand your point.