This is all true. I don't disagree with you. But. (There's always a but.) I'm not disputing that the US isn't a great economic powerhouse. What I'm getting at

This is all true. I don't disagree with you. But. (There's always a but.) I'm not disputing that the US isn't a great economic powerhouse. What I'm getting at is, at what cost. If the middle-class gets gutted and relative and absolute poverty keeps increasing then we're not really creating a just society, are we? In one of the wealthiest, if not the wealthiest nation ever if we still haven't figured out how to protect the most vulnerable among us then we've a bit of a problem. As some have suggested, maybe basic income is a solution? But to others you may as well have suggested that that dude Stalin may have made a nice omelette even though he broke a few eggs. And outside the US, what the untenable situation where two countries (neither of which are the US) have to trade oil in dollars. For just how long do you think that arrangement will last? It could be, and has been, argued that some part of the might of the US comes from having its currency as the world currency and part of that is dollar-denominated trade. Cease that and the landscape alters. China knows that. Others know that.