1.1 The Land, the People, and the Economy

The United States comprises 50 states and several self-governing territories and possessions. Its land spans nine official time zones across the Western Hemisphere, the Pacific Ocean, and the Caribbean Sea. At 3.5 million square miles, the country is the third largest in the world by size and has the third largest population with about 325 million people. On the North American continent, the hills, low mountains,  and broad river valleys in the east give way to vast plains west of the Mississippi River. Rugged mountains and deserts mark the western landscape. The country encompasses the world's largest coal reserves but also substantial stocks of minerals, ores, oil, natural gas, forests, arable land, fresh water, and people. These resources determine the vigor of our economy and affect the laws and priorities we set as a country. We are free to exploit our resources for our own needs, or we can export them to bring in money from other parts of the world.

The land can also be a basis of political conflict. For example, in the western part of the country, the public owns much of the land, which has been a long-standing source of disagreement between the people living there and the federal government. Lately, oil and natural gas extraction, aided by a process called hydraulic fracturing or fracking, has led to controversies over its contribution to water and air pollution, global warming, and possible triggering of earthquakes. The large size of the country continues to present a challenge to the provision of transportation, water, electricity, sanitation, and communications infrastructure, especially for rural and remote areas.

The most fundamental determinate of politics and public policy is the population. For most of the country’s history, the U.S. population increased steadily along with its physical territory. Natural increase (the greater number of births over deaths) was the major contributor to population growth in early America, given the needs of an agricultural economy, early marriage, and large families. After 1830, with the beginnings of immigration and industrialization, urban populations started to grow and continued high levels of population growth (more than 20 percent per decade) until World War I and the Great Depression. Since then, natural population increase has declined (with the exception of the Baby Boom era), and the country’s population has been sustained by immigration from Latin America, Asia, and other regions.

Population growth and decline has political consequences. In the years of rapid growth, the country struggled to provide roads, bridges, and schools. Cities strained to provide housing, law enforcement, and manage waste. But today’s slow population growth also brings problems. With fewer working-age people, fewer tax dollars are available to support a growing retired population with a longer life expectancy. If we pursue a policy to reduce immigration by limiting immigration and deporting undocumented workers and their families, we will exacerbate the problem.

The composition of the population also matters. From the beginning of the country until about 1940, more than 80 percent of Americans were non-Hispanic whites. Since then, the white population has been declining relative to other racial groups, but still comprises the majority of the population in every region and every state except Hawaii. The percentage of Black Americans has held steady, but the percentage of Latina/o and Asian Americans has increased significantly. The percentage of Native Americans has grown since the 1940s, but still only amounts to about 1 percent of the total.

The United States is becoming more diverse every year, and by the middle of the twenty-first century, whites may cease to be the majority as a combination of Black, Latinas/o, Asian, and other groups account for slightly more. If trends continue such that Democrats remain the dominant choice among minority groups and Republicans build strength among whites in general and working-class whites in particular, an increasingly diverse population could provide a basis for political conflict. According to the 2015 American Values Survey, most supporters of Republican candidates (56 percent) say that immigrants are a burden to the United States because they take American jobs, housing, and health care. Nearly 80 percent of the supporters of President Donald Trump agreed with these sentiments and added that discrimination against whites has become as big a problem as discrimination against Black Americans and other minorities.

The United States has the most robust and powerful economy in the world. The country is home to some of the most technologically advanced firms in the areas of computers, pharmaceuticals, aerospace, medical, communications, and military equipment. Individuals and businesses in the United States buy most goods and services from the private marketplace. Even federal, state, and local governments buy most of their goods and contract many of their services from private firms. Decisions to invest in a new factory, develop new products, or to close a facility and lay off workers are mostly in private hands.

New technologies and increasing interdependence of world economies has caused the development of a “two-tier” labor market in which people lacking technical skills and education fail to get comparable pay, health insurance coverage, and other benefits relative to those with higher education and professional/technical skills. At the same time, economic globalization The increasing movement of goods, labor, and services across borders due to interdependence of the world economies. has forced low-wage workers in the United States to compete with low-wage workers in other parts of the world. Since the mid-1970s, practically all the gains in household income and wealth have gone to the top 20 percent of households. Incomes for the top 10 percent of Americans now average more than nine times the bottom 90 percent, while the top 1 percent averages more than 40 times the bottom 90 percent. Other economic problems for the Unites States include inadequate investment in deteriorating infrastructure and rapidly rising medical and pension costs.