Not that great, says Steve Clemons, who has looked closely at the report on global competitiveness.
The picture is not good. One of the few categories in which the US leads the world is "University-industry collaboration in R&D" -- and many engineering and science department chiefs, most recently at UC San Diego, tell me that America can't afford to take this leadership position for granted.
The rest of the news? Here's the report on the US.
And here's a random clip from one part of it -- ranking number on the far right.
2.09 Mobile telephone subscriptions/100 pop.*......... 89.9............87
3.01 Government budget balance, % GDP*.............. -10.6 ..........139
3.02 Gross national savings, % GDP*.........................11.6 ..........121
3.03 Inflation, annual % change*...................................1.6 ..............1
3.04 Interest rate spread, %*....................................... 2.9 ............26
3.05 General government debt, % GDP*....................91.6 ..........132
3.06 Country credit rating, 0–100 (best)* ....................91.4 ..............9
4.01 Business impact of malaria ............................ N/Appl. ..............1
4.02 Malaria cases/100,000 pop.* .............................. (NE) ..............1
4.03 Business impact of tuberculosis ........................... 5.6 ............61
4.04 Tuberculosis incidence/100,000 pop.* .................. 4.1 ..............4
4.05 Business impact of HIV/AIDS ............................... 4.9 ............87
4.06 HIV prevalence, % adult pop.* ............................. 0.6 ............93
4.07 Infant mortality, deaths/1,000 live births*............. 6.8 ............41
4.08 Life expectancy, years*....................................... 78.7............32
4.09 Quality of primary education................................. 4.6 ............37
4.10 Primary education enrollment, net %*............... 92.0............77
5.01 Secondary education enrollment, gross %*....... 94.1............50
5.02 Tertiary education enrollment, gross %*............ 82.9..............6
5.03 Quality of the educational system ........................ 4.7 ............26
5.04 Quality of math and science education ................ 4.3 ............51
5.05 Quality of management schools ........................... 5.4 ............ 12
