The 2015 Index of Economic Freedom has been published by The Wall Street
Journal and The Heritage Foundation.
The Index can be a useful and
objective tool for analyzing the economies of nations and shows how economic
freedoms and historical data can provide principles and facts for anyone
studying the fundamentals of economic growth and prosperity. The Heritage Foundation has a new guide
entitled Using the Index of Economic
Freedom that will help those using the Index
in research, public policy, business, and advocacy.
The Heritage Foundation defines
economic freedom as “the fundamental
right of every human to control his or her own labor and property. In an economically free society, individuals
are free to work, produce, consume, and invest in any way they please. In economically free societies, governments
allow labor, capital, and goods to move freely, and refrain from coercion or
constraint of liberty beyond the extent necessary to protect and maintain
liberty itself.”
Throughout most of human history
economic freedom and opportunity was rare, causing people to live in poverty
and deprivation. We are fortunate today
to live in “the most prosperous time in human history” with “poverty, sicknesses,
and ignorance receding throughout the world.”
All this has been “fueled” by nations using “the principles of economic
freedom.” The most important result of
economic freedom is “greater prosperity,” and the Index “documents the positive relationship between economic freedom
and a variety of positive social and economic goals. The ideals of economic freedom are strongly
associated with healthier societies, cleaner environments, greater per capita
wealth, human development, democracy, and poverty elimination.” With these benefits, every nation should
strive for total economic freedom!
The effort to measure economic
freedom in 186 countries is “based on 10 quantitative and qualitative factors,
grouped into four broad categories, or pillars, of economic freedom.” Those four groups are: “(1) Rule of Law (property
rights, freedom from corruption); (2) Limited Government (fiscal freedom,
government spending); (3) Regulatory Efficiency (business freedom, labor freedom,
monetary freedom; and
(4)
Open
Markets
(trade freedom, investment freedom, financial freedom).” Each of the ten economic freedoms is graded
on a scale of 0 to 100, with the average being the overall score for each
country. The Index covers the period from July 2013 through June 2014.
“The Index of Economic Freedom considers every component equally important
in achieving the positive benefits of economic freedom. Each freedom is weighted equally in
determining country scores.”
So with all this information,
how well do you think the United States of America did when compared to other
countries we think of as “free”? The
United States ranked twelfth. The
countries considered to be “free” are:
(1) Hong Kong, (2) Singapore, (3) New Zealand,
(4)
Australia, and (5) Switzerland. The
countries considered to be “mostly free” are:
(6) Canada, (7) Chile, (8) Estonia, (9) Ireland,
(10)
Mauritius, (11) Denmark, (12) United States, (13) United Kingdom, (14) Taiwan,
(15) Lithuania, (16) Germany, (17) the Netherlands,
(18)
Bahrain, (19) Finland, and (20) Japan – plus fifteen more nations including
(25) United Arab Emirates, (29) South Korea, (32) Qatar, and
(33)
Israel.
How do you feel about your
nation – the home of the free and the land of the brave – being considered “mostly
free”? I am disappointed and think we
can do much better! We really do need to
reduce the size of our government and stop spending ourselves into debt. We as citizens of what should be the most
free nation on earth can do our part by becoming more self-reliant and
requiring less from the federal purse.
We can only do this if we can root the corruption out of our federal,
state and local governments and elect good men and women who will stand up for
us and protect our many freedoms.
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