| Percent | Low Average High | | on poverty, 1994, p. 6). | Who Are +----------------------| | | Poor | 40 24 10 | | Thomas (1994, p. A2) | +----------------------+ |
| Source: Lowdown, 1994, p. 6 | reported that the gap in +----------------------------------+
both income and wealth is widening between the rich and the poor in the United States. Luttwak (1994, pp. 46 52) concluded that the United States could deteriorate into a Third World country if the economic decline that has transpired over the past 20 years continues the trend at an unabated pace. This situation is well illustrated through a comparison of per capita gross national product growth in the United States with that in Japan. This comparison is presented in Table 2, which may be found below.
Table 2 Japan took the lead in the
Comparative Income Growth measure of per capital
+----------------------------------+ gross national product in | Per Capita GNP |
| +----------------------+ | in a period of less than | | Japan USA | | | +----------------------| | two decades nineteen
| 1970 | $ 1,950 $ 4,950 | |
| 1989 | $23,810 $21,000 | | years. By the year 2000, | +----------------------+ |
| Source: Luttwak, 1994, pp. 46 52 | per capita gross national
+----------------------------------+
product in Japan is expected to be double that in the United States (Luttwak, 1994, pp. 46 52). One explanation offered for this trend is the "pervasive and increasingly accepted lack of work skills among the American public that is attributed to the failure of the American education system (p. 49). Some predictions call for the United States to slip into a Third World status by the ...