There are some very smart people in the United States, but most of the population is about as intelligent as a door nail. One of the reasons why the U.S. is in such a bad shape right now is that the plan was to outsource all the manufacturing, while the rest of us did the research and engineering, except… that did not materialize, as even those who could afford to go to college were simply too lazy and dumb to major in science and engineering… Ergo, now there is tremendous need for scientists, doctors and engineers, and nobody to fill those jobs… most of the population is only capable of basic menial work, and now that the manufacturing jobs are gone, the whole country is in a very bad shape…
I have studied this for many years. In the United States, the problem is in large part genetic. IQ is in large part inherited from parents; the other major factor is upbringing. Both are problematic, leading to the situation where the few who are either smart and educated, or completely corrupt command high paying jobs, while the rest barely scrape by. One acute symptom of this is that people are working 40+ hours per week, and still have to supplement their income with food stamps. Low IQ -> inability to major in science or engineering -> poor marketability -> low standard of living. And from experience, when you have existential problems, you are not likely to pursue intellectual subjects.
Added 6 minutes later:
“Norway has a population of 5 Million individuals, while Italy has a population of roughly 60 Million. Now let’s count the number and quality of demos released in these two countries. Mmmh… no, it doesn’t match.”
I dispute that: Norway produced A.C.E. on the C=64, they had the famous Razor 1911 and Agile branches, they have Andromeda, they developed their own processor (the name of which I cannot remember right now)… for such a small country, those are tremendous achievements. And further proof of their brains is that they arranged for themselves a government and a country which provides them with close to the highest standard of living on the planet.
