[1] Cullen Murphy,Are We Rome?The Fall of an Empire and the Fate of America(New York:Mariner Books,2007).
[2] Paul Kennedy,The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers:Economic Change and Military Conflict Among the Great Powers from1500to2000(New York:Random House,1987).
[3] Of course,there were many more causes of this complex phenomenon.See Ramsay MacMullen,Corruption and the Decline of Rome(New Haven:Yale University Press,1988).
[4] See Nicholas Kristof,"We're not No.1!We're not No.1!"New York Times,April3,2014.
[5] "The jobs machine,"The Economist,April13,2013.
[6] Klaus Schwab and Xavier Sala-i-Martin,The Global Competitiveness Report2013-14(Davos:World Economic Forum,2013).Niall Ferguson,"How America lost its way,"Wall Street Journal,June7,2013.
[7] Technically Recoverable Shale Oil and Shale Gas Resources:An Assessment of137Shale Formations in41Countries Outside the United States(Washington,DC:US Energy Information Agency,2013),p.3.
[8] 2014Global R&D Funding Forecast(Columbus:Batelle Memorial Institute,2014).
[9] US Patent Statistics Chart,Calendar Years1963-2013(Washington,DC:The United States Patent and Trademark Office).
[10] For a more optimistic view of American savings,see Richard N.Cooper,"Global imbalances:Globalization,demography,and sustainability,"Journal of Economic Perspectives22,Summer2008,p.95.
[11] Niall Ferguson,"An empire at risk,"Newsweek,December7,2009,p.28;and"A Greek crisis is coming to America,"Financial Times,February11,2010.See also,Francis Warnock,"How dangerous is US government debt?The risk of a sudden spike in US interest rates,"Council on Foreign Relations Report,June2010;available at:http:///publication/22408/how_dangerous_is_us_government_debt.html.
[12] Institute of Higher Education of Shanghai Jiao Tong University,"Academic ranking of the world universities-2009";available at:http:///ARWU2009.jsp.
[13] "Are higher and lower performing students making gains?"The Nation's Report Card(Washington,DC:National Center for Education Statistics,US Department of Education,2013);available at:http:///reading_math_2013/#/gains-percentiles.
[14] Viktória Kis and Simon Field,Time for the US to Reskill?What the Survey of Adult Skills Says(Washington,DC:Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development,2013),p.12.
[15] Sam Dillon,"Many nations passing US in education,expert says,"New York Times,March10,2010.
[16] "Gini in the bottle,"The Economist,November26,2013.
[17] Eduardo Porter,"A relentless widening of disparity in wealth,"New York Times,March12,2014;"Class in America:Mobility measured,The Economist,February1,2014;Lawrence Summers,"US inequality goes beyond dollars and cents,"Washington Post,June8,2014.
[18] Francis Fukuyama,"American power is waning because Washington won't stop quarreling,"The New Republic,March10,2014.