But I want to raise questions about the the Heritage Foundation report, The 2023 Index of Economic Freedom, which ranks countries on the basis of "economic freedom".
One trouble with such sweeping global analyses is that international data sets are spotty at best. Plus judgement calls need to be made, but the study's analysts don't fully reveal the assumptions of their research. Plus the experts chosen to oversee such studies may come from "elite" academic institutions like Harvard.
And 27 years ago, this Report was originally produced by the Wall Street Journal, the bastion of America's big business interests, before the Heritage Foundation continued its annual publication.
To me, these are warning signs that there's room for a secret elite- and big-business-approved agenda in such a report.
To cite one example, the 2023 report says the quality of Labor Freedom in the United States has gone up since the last report.
And the report's methodology says the level of Labor Freedom is determined by nine factors (equally weighted) such as: Minimum Wage, Labor Participation, and Labor Productivity.
But the analysis of Labor Freedom absolutely fails to mention the crisis on the Mexican border. Millions of low income illegals are crossing the border and competing for jobs against American citizens.
Indeed, the word "immigration" appears nowhere in the Methodology? Why? I suspect because the authors are hiding its impact on America's "Economic Freedom" because big business wants illegals coming in to lower their labor losses.
But who can set the record straight? We know that Fox news, despite a few MAGA supporters among its commentators, is RINO country and worse.
So this is why independent voices like FR and commentators like Tucker Carlson and Richard Baris of the People's Pundit are so valuable to America's future.
NOTE: To understand the damage big business has wrought on American labor and local taxpayers over the decades, I suggest the book, The Great American Jobs Scam.
The full contents of each chapter in the book can be downloaded at the link provided above. For a quick view of the book, read the Foreword or the book's first chapter.
Why Do The Poor Countries Always Stay So Poor?
I can answer that question very easily.....corruption and theft.
Is anyone paying attention to what is happening in Western Africa? Burkina Faso, Niger, Mali? They just formed a security alliance. They are tired of foreign countries stripping their countries of any wealth they might have via minerals, precious metals, oil, etc.
Take Captain Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. Listen to some of the speeches he’s made and what he wants for his country and its people. They’re tired of entities like the US Dept of State or whatever the French version of it is and their puppet master corporations coming in, making a ridiculous deal with corrupt government leadership, only to see the country be devastated.
Take the Congo. They have all the metal for EVs, do they not? Yet they’re still eating dirt. Why? The DRC could have the EV world eating out of its hand and could raise that country out of the poverty it’s in, but they choose not to. The leadership and select few are stuffing bank accounts in Dubai or Western Europe, the Chinese and Muck are raping the country, and when things turn, the leadership will be on a plane out of there, where they will live in luxury, while their country still eats dirt.
South Africa....that place is being absolutely raped by the current government. And now, guys like Malema are gaining even more traction as things get worse and worse.
It is understandable that populists wouldn’t like the index of economic freedom as the index positively weights free trade. The problem for populists is that the free trade component of the index is positively correlated with standards of living and with rate of economic growth, either by itself or in a multi-factor analysis that includes the other components.
Hey, how did that Hawley-Smoot tariff turn out?