RALEIGH – More than a century ago, the Ottoman Empire acquired the sobriquet “The Sick Man of Europe.” For centuries a dynamic force in the Mediterranean World – militarily superior, economically vital, a beacon of relative toleration in a sea of religious extremism – the regime of the Osmanli Turks gradually devolved into a decadent, listless society incapable of adapting to change and reliant on over-taxed trade routes that Europeans increasingly bypassed with ocean-going fleets.
Today, it would be unfair to call the successor state of Turkey by that name, in part because much of Europe has succumbed to a similar illness. There is no “Sick Man of Europe” anymore, in the sense that one can’t identify a single patient and call him the “Sick Man of the Hospital.”
Not all of Europe is ill, of course. While poorer than their Western cousins, the new republics of the former Soviet Union are posting dramatic annual growth rates, especially in countries that adopted flat income taxes over the past decade. In the West, Great Britain and Ireland are bucking the continental trend with healthy economies and, in the former case, a continuing ability and willingness to play a constructive role in foreign and military affairs.
But as a remarkable set of articles in the most recent issue of The American Enterprise magazine lay out in significant detail, Europe is falling behind on a variety of indices – and the prospects for revitalization aren’t promising. Faulty public policies are to blame for many of Europe’s problems, including stubbornly high unemployment rates and stagnation or declines in living standards.
I’ve always been a big fan of the colorful series of graphs and tables in each issue of The American Enterprise – actually, this was a major selling point of the magazine in its earlier incarnation, Public Opinion – and the Europe issue doesn’t disappoint in this area. Here are some highlights:
• 63 percent of Americans are employed, vs. about half of the Germans and French and only 45 percent of Italians.
• In the U.S., only 18 percent of unemployment spells last at least six months. In France, it’s 54 percent, in Germany 65 percent, and in Italy an astounding 76 percent.
• Government spending makes up a much smaller share of the American economy (35 percent) than of continental Europe (where the rates are in the 50s). But that doesn’t mean Europeans are more accomplished, educated, or contented. Quite the opposite: American spending on higher education, still mostly private, vastly exceeds European spending as a share of GDP, and the U.S. predominates in most indicators of scholarly achievement and technological innovation.
The capper is this. Asked by pollsters how satisfied they are with their lives, 57 percent of Americans say “very satisfied.” Only 17 percent of Germans, 16 percent of Italians, and 14 percent of Frenchmen say the same. Most Europeans agree with the statement that “success is determined by forces outside our control,” while most Americans disagree.
In short, when advocates of bigger government in North Carolina and the nation sing the praises of European-style health care, labor markets, housing programs, or welfare benefits, remember that while many Europeans still seek to emigrate here, few Americans attempt the reverse. There’s a good reason why this is so.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.