Review “[A] lively little book.... [Kenny's] convincing conclusion argues that Western countries should take steps now to lock in global rules and institutions that will protect their interests and values in a future in which they will be less powerful.”—Foreign Affairs“Among the many tomes that have been written on (relative) American decline, Charles Kenny's new book, The Upside of Down, is the rare one that embraces it.... His book proves not only a ‘refreshing antidote to prophecies of American decline,' to quote the dust jacket, but also an idea-rich guide for preventing such prophecies from becoming self-fulfilling.... Kenny makes a compelling case that ‘the greatest threat to a brighter future is to dwell on the risk of failure.'”—Boston Review“Upbeat without being Panglossian, Kenny's starting point is that the relative decline is inevitable. The rise of the rest is not only well under way. It is also desirable.... Kenny's account of US misdirectedness is salient. Yet he never strays too far from his chief argument—the west has all the resources it needs to make life better for all of its people. That, after all, is what the game should be about.”—Financial Times“America's declining influence in the world has been the subject of many books, articles and spirited debates. Charles Kenny explains why the declinists are wrong and surprises us with insights that are as original as they are persuasive. Read this book if you want to be reassured about America's future.”—Moisés Naím, Carnegie Endowment and author of The End of Power: From Boardrooms to Battlefields and Churches to States, Why Being In Charge Isn't What it Used to Be“Only Charles Kenny could write a cheerful book about decline. But by showing that relative decline actually means absolute gain when measuring the progress of the United States against rising powers such as Brazil, India, China, and parts of Africa, Kenny opens the door to a far more positive vision of the future, one that is backed by data rather than dreams and that inspires both hope and energy. The Upside of Down turned my world right side up!”—Anne-Marie Slaughter, President and CEO of the New America Foundation and Bert G. Kerstetter ‘66 University Professor Emerita of Politics and International Affairs, Princeton University“[Kenny] argues that just because one nation is winning does not mean another must lose; instead, he shows convincingly how the benefits of success spread far beyond borders.... [H]is statistic-laden polemic is ultimately a glorious hymn to the transformative powers of globalisation, showing the beneficial impact for everyone as countries become richer, healthier and smarter.... Once again, Kenny offers a powerful antidote to the poisonous pessimism that prevails in too many places.”—The Observer (UK) “An optimistic view of the future economy—refreshing…”—Kirkus Reviews“Charles Kenny is the real deal: an optimist with an economist's data to back him up. So when he looks at the glass and sees it's half full—you can rest assured it's not because he needs new contacts. In The Upside of Down, he carefully dismantles our preconceived notions about American decline and the rise of the rest—and makes a convincing case by the end for why we shouldn't be too worried about either.”—Susan Glasser, editor, POLITICO Magazine Read more About the Author Charles Kenny, previously a senior economist at the World Bank, is now a senior fellow at the Center for Global Development and a columnist for Bloomberg Businessweek and Foreign Policy magazines. He lives in Washington, DC. Read more
R**O
Lucid and Convincing
Is America in decline? Should we fear the rise of China? Are immigrants draining our county of prosperity as well as posing a threat to our national security? Is the glass half-full or half-empty? According to Charles Kenny, author of “The Upside of Down,” it’s all a matter of how you look at it. Kenny makes a compelling case that despite economic forecasts of doom and gloom, the world is actually a better place to live than it was fifty years ago, or thirty years ago, or even ten years ago. He also makes the case that as other nations achieve prosperity, it benefits rather than hurts the U.S. economy, by creating new markets for U.S. businesses. Kenny supports his arguments with a wealth of data presented in clear and lucid writing that makes for easy comprehension—in all of 198 pages.Kenny uses statistics to bust a number of myths. For example: forecasts are seldom accurate. In the 1990s, predictions were for the big three economic powers to be the U.S., Great Britain, and Japan. Today, that has changed to the U.S., China, and India. While China and India have enjoyed 10 percent economic growth for several years, much of that growth has come as the result of U.S. technology, which was decades in the making and is now immediately beneficial to those two economies (and to the rest of the world). While China and India have grown prosperous, for the most part their people have not. The products these two countries produce are not as yet affordable to the vast working class—a very telling indicator that not everything is as rosy as it would seem. As long as the lower and middle classes fail to benefit from economic gains, China and India have a long way to go before they truly rival the U.S. economy.Kenny also makes the point that the U.S. is not falling behind economically. Rather, the rest of the world is catching up. Is this a bad thing? Not at all. As the rest of the world catches up economically, the world itself becomes a safer place to live. Poverty in all its forms—lack of food and safe drinking water, disease, ignorance—is the biggest threat to world peace. As more countries join the world economy, the better it is for everyone. Kenny cites disease as an example. Less disease in third world countries means the health of U.S. citizens is less at risk.What about the sluggish U.S. economic growth? The rate for several years has been pegged at slightly better than 2 percent. Bad, right? Wrong. Two percent is the norm. Kenny says 2 percent growth has been the average since way back when. The heady days of the tech boom at the end of the 1990s saw growth rates maybe half-a-percent faster than this average. The story is similar for Western Europe. Mature economies are just that, and cannot accurately be compared with emerging economies, which have a great deal of catching up to do. As these emerging economies mature, the growth rate will decrease.What about immigration? Does it hurt our economy? Kenny makes the point that immigrants do the work that most American’s try to avoid—washing dishes, digging ditches, maid service in homes and in hotels, gardening, care of the infirm and elderly, etc. Immigrants are good for business, because they hold up the lower end, and actually help increase the hourly wage rate. At the same time, as cheap labor, they keep the cost of living down. As important, the influx of immigrants insures the ratio of workers to retirees remains constant thereby insuring that such government programs as Medicare and Social Security continue without interruption.And what about the threat presented by terrorists that lies purportedly at the root of stopping immigrants from entering the country? In fact, domestic right-wing extremist groups are far more dangerous, having carried out twice as many attacks as jihadist-affiliated groups in the U.S. since 9/11. The author notes that the global total for the five years from 1999 to 2003—the years spanning the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington—was 5,553 people. “Those deaths were a tragedy,” say Kenny, “but they amount to less than one-fifth of the number of people who died in traffic fatalities in the United States alone.” In fact, extremist Islamic terrorism results in 200 to 400 deaths worldwide outside of the war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq—the same number as die in bathtubs in the U.S. alone each year.What about the costs to keep terrorists from entering the country? According to one estimate of the direct and indirect costs borne by the U.S. as a result of 9/11, the attacks have caused $55 billion in “toll and physical damage,” that the economic impact has been $123 billion, and that costs related to increased homeland security spending and funding wars have totaled $3,105 billion. Federal immigrant enforcement cost $18 billion in 2012 alone—more than was spent on all other major federal law enforcement agencies, including the FBI and the ATF combined.There is much more to “The Upside of Down.” Terrorism is a very real threat, but so is driving your car on the highway. China, India and a host of other nations—including Africa and South America—are catching up. This is to be welcomed, because it makes the world a safer and better place to live. Before the U.S. became a world leader, Great Britain was the nation at the top. Relegated down a notch certainly has not hurt them, economically or otherwise, nor will it hurt the U.S., should that day ever come.Living in the U.S. is a privilege, with clean water and abundant and inexpensive food, reliable electricity, indoor plumbing, modern dentistry, and access to the best doctors in the world. Not everything is perfect, nor will it ever be. But the economic trend over the past 200 years has been ever upward, despite a bloody civil war, two world wars, a number of depressions (one lasting 10 years), and terrorists groups who have been ever with us (since before the first world war—check your history books). Kenny puts it all in perspective, and reveals the glass as not half-full but overflowing. Five stars.
D**K
Debunking F.U.D.
While I won't go so far as to say that this is a "must read" book, I will be highly recommending it to individuals who need a little push away from isolationism, or have a hard time understanding the economics behind globalization. Charles Kenny starts off the book by very clearly telling us that a lot of what he says is going to be open to debate, and he's very frank in that most predicitions about future economic climates turn out to be hilariously off-point; but he does a fantastic job at coming to well-reasoned (if debatable) conclusions while citing his sources.This is primarily an economics book. As such, it talks about the GDP of countries and of the global economy, and how economic factors can impact social and governance issues. So while the book's main topic is economics, its purpose is to explain how a changing economic landscape (China, et al, eclipsing the United States) is not something that the United States should fear. In order to best do that, the author takes liberties in outlining the specific issues of our current generation.For example, global warming is something that is of little scientific debate, but is hotly debated in the public arena of American politics. So, while Kenny does not debate the merits of global warming arguments (of either side), he states the information as fact while both reducing the "end is nigh" mentality of climate changers and expressing how emission reduction would not hurt our GDP enough to affect the quality of life of climate change deniers.Similarly, he looks at issues like (il)legal immigration and gender rights with the same sort of analytical process. He doesn't get *into* the issues, but acknowledges that a debate exists and how the rise of the East's economies would positively affect the West's life with regards to that debate. However, for readers with a particularly conservative bent, you may have difficulty brushing the debate under the rug as there are few (if any) concessions to opposing view points.Overall the book did its job very well. It dispelled a lot of the FUD (Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt) associated with the relative slipping over the American economy, and instilled readers with a new found understanding and hope for the rise of the global economy. It did so with reputable sources and without clashing with any generally accepted knowledge (for example, his predictions on global poverty levels are not far off from Gates').
T**N
... can the loss of American global supremacy be a good thing for America
How can the loss of American global supremacy be a good thing for America? It may sound counter-intuitive but Charles Kenny does an excellent job of showing how getting past the 'us vs. them' mindset will benefit everyone - if done correctly.
B**S
Five Stars
Very informative!
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