I DON’T THINK THIS IS RIGHT, AND I CERTAINLY HOPE THAT IT ISN’T: What if everything we’ve come to think of as American is predicated on a freak coincidence of economic history? And what if that coincidence has run its course? My experience is that you read articles like this a few years before some new economic driver appears. But while I have a near-Kurzweilian faith in technology as an economic driver, it is, by necessity, faith, not knowledge.

That said, I think a lot of leftists like to believe there’s a fixed pot of goodies, and then arrogate to themselves the power to distribute its contents. Declinism fits their preferences better than growth.