Interesting story, I have never heard of this loophole but that makes total sense. Strange it is not talked about more.

Yeah Americans have obviously done many things right, but I think it is important to highlight all the benefits they have enjoyed. My motivation is not to belittle American economic success.

It is just that understanding the source of American prosperity is important when discussing different politican and economical systems. I am a social democrat. I believe in a society which takes more care of its citizens through stronger worker rights, welfare services, universal health care etc.

I believe Nordic countries and many other European countries have shown that it is possible to combine a compasionate society with economic prosperity. However American conservative and capitalism fanboys like to paint Europe as a laggard and these welfare policies as failures for the simple reason that Europe is still not as rich as the US.

However I don't think Europe ever had the conditions to achieve American style prosperity and probably never will. We simply lack the resources to do so.

That applies to most of the world. You can see how Japan and South Korea has had amazing success but they have not caught up with the US, and likely never will. That is not because their countries are badly run but because they lack the fundamental physical advantages the US has.

But this reality should not spur other nations to attempt to adopt to human unfriendly American style capitalism in a vain belief that this would result in American style economic prosperity.

Quite the contrary I believe America could adopt a more social demcoratic system and still retain most of the economic advantages.