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America is great because
America is good,” wrote Alexis de Tocqueville more than 170 years ago. That is no less true today. Not only is America good-hearted, but America creates more wealth than any country on the face of the earth. America’s free market economy, with its private property rights, rule of law, democratic government, and individual freedom is the greatest force for good in the world today. Whether it is abundant food supply, sustainable environment, freedom of choice, or care for the needy, the entrepreneurial spirit of capitalism creates the greatest good for the greatest number of people.
Capitalism establishes voluntary relationships between customers and providers. It allows innovators and entrepreneurs to create an abundance that spreads opportunity to work, to earn, and to make choices. Capitalism generates increases in productivity and solutions to new problems that allow an ever greater population to enjoy a better life.
It is no mystery that America has one of the highest rates of home ownership in the world - almost 70 percent. And the average size of an American home is almost twice the size of the average European home.
America also has one of the highest rates of charitable giving — reaching record levels. America’s rate is significantly higher than in Europe and the rest of the world. Individual Americans and businesses share their prosperity with those less fortunate because caring for those in need is an American value and because, with the cornucopia created by capitalism, we simply have more to give.
Some Europeans and the American left point to the fact that the U.S. has not ratified the Kyoto treaty as evidence that we are irresponsible about the environment. But there is good evidence that American ingenuity and industry are doing a better job of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions than European signers of the treaty. Although the U.S. economy is growing much faster than the EU economy, between 1995 and today, greenhouse-gas emissions in the EU grew at almost twice the rate of emissions in the U.S. The big difference is that Europe has depended on government mandates, while America has unleashed competitive enterprise to solve environmental problems.
Free market capitalism not only provides prosperity
95.5%