The Accidental Superpower

 Mr. Peter Zeihan.

I'm enjoying more books on geopolitics. Zeihan looks at the Geography and Demography of countries and regions around the world. He then makes long term predictions.

Canada for example-- Ontario and Quebec are getting older. As they do so, they will stop paying as much tax as the used to. Alberta is young and has a bumper crop of resources. Much tax burden will shift to it. Alberta will be angry for decades to come. With their resources, they they feel like they should be rich. But they have limited power to sell those resources globally-- they are land locked. The U.S. has no reason to let Alta freely sell. Nor does B.C.

Zeihan is also not optimistic about the future of Russia and China. They both have demographic cliffs in the coming decades. For sometime in these countries. the births and immigration has not matched the rate that people are growing old or dyeing. Old people, without jobs, are a drain on the resources of a country. There aren't enough young people to shore up the dwindling resources. Times will get tough.

Zeihan is very optimistic about the U.S. There is no demographic cliff. There is enough shale oil to feed the countries energy demands for decades. And the underlaying geography of the country still supports a strong economy.

Natural ports-- the U.S. has more natural deep water ports than the rest of the world combined. Even If other countries (Canada? Brazil?) wanted to have an trade as large as the U.S- they wouldn't be able  because there are too many bottle necks to get goods into, or out of, those countries. 

In "Prisons of Geography" Marshall tells the story of a Chinese official who pushes back on U.S. values saying... "Why do you think your values will work in a culture that you don't understand?" I understand that statement a bit more. The land along the Yellow river is very fertile, yet there are constant floods and droughts that would regularly destroy a Western style farm. It's only through large scale collective planning that this area can grow the food that it does. Of course there is large scale, planned government here. The area would be desolate otherwise.