Burlington High School
Burlington, Kansas
Teacher: Devra Parker
Economic Success and Failure
By Michael Lawson
12th Grade
Superpower, many countries deteriorate to achieve it, while others wait until it is time to prosper. Many of the world’s countries have better advantages over the rest while the others are just stuck with the little amount they have. This is where international trade comes to play. Without the ability and the trust to trade, the world would not have to worry about superpower countries because there wouldn’t be any. Every country has something to offer, even if it is very little. The four countries that have many strengths and weaknesses that no one really hears about are Estonia, South Korea, Rwanda, and Iran.
Estonia was ruled for centuries by the Russians, Danish, Swedish, and the Germans until 1918. After the First World War, Estonia gained their independence and started to thrive in the new world. In the 1940’s, however, the USSR forced the Estonians back under their control until 1991 when the Soviets were destroyed. Even though the Soviets were destroyed, it wasn’t until 1994 when the last of the Russian army left the land of Estonia.
Located in Eastern Europe, bordering the Baltic Sea and the gulf of Sweden, Estonia has become one of the highest rated countries in the world. Not well known to the US, Estonia exports billions of its electricity to its surrounding countries. The ironic part of this is that the surrounding countries that they export to used to control them. So, in a way Estonia controls them now. The electricity is there strongest export they have, but they are not the leading producers of electricity in Europe. The weakest area in this country is how much they spend on imports. The amount spent is $7.318 billion, while the export is $5.701 billion. Estonia loses about 1.617 billion dollars a day.
South Korea is located in the eastern hemisphere right below North Korea. The history of North and South Korea is dark and bloody. So bad, in fact, that the United States had to put mines all over the 38th parallel (the border of north and south) just to keep the peace. South Korea’s economic standings are 14 times better then North Korea and equal to the lesser economies of the European Union. In 2004, South Korea joined the “Trillion Dollar Club” of the world economies. South Korea showed their weakness during the 1997-1999 Asian financial crisis, which is understandable. It showed that they had a large amount of debt, massive foreign borrowing, and undisciplined finances.
Rwanda is well known for their genocide that occurred in 1994. That genocide decimated their already poor economy into mush. The main industry in this tiny country was agriculture. 90% of the people did this for a living.
Located in Africa, Rwanda is the most densely populated country. More than 60% of its people are too poor to do anything. Since the country is way too poor to rely on its own, more than 190.22 million dollars are lost because of imports.
Compared to the United States, we dominate in every category. Rwanda gets a lot of aid from us and the HIPC just because we feel guilty for the Rwanda genocide.
Iran is a troubled, inefficient country that can’t be controlled. One of the leading oil producing countries, Iran produces more than four million barrels a day, bringing in 38.79 billion dollars.
Controlled by President Khatami, Iran could be considered as a dictatorship. Before Khatami, Iran was controlled by the Taliban, a ruthless regime of terrorists who killed anyone in their way. The Taliban believed in the Sharia law. An example of this could be the female years back who was pregnant without being married. To be punished for her actions, they buried her up to her head, and she was sentenced to stoning to death. The United States got word of this and put a stop to it, but they put a stop to that one case. Many other cases of stoning have been reported, but the citizens of the US didn’t really hear that much about them. Another example could be that somewhere in Iran, there is a soccer field, which was built and funded by the United States that was at the time, being used as their killing fields.
In conclusion, Estonia, South Korea, Rwanda, and Iran all rely on imports and exports to other countries. Without the ability to do either, no one would be able to modernize and advance in the fast growing pace of this new world. Estonia deserves to be in the top five because of its growing economic status while Iran is in its right place.
Answers To Questions Prompted By The Required Reading
The
Benefits of Free Trade
Q1- Be the Devil's Advocate and counter Benjamin Franklin's statement that "No
nation was ever ruined by trade."
This statement in untrue given the fact that the United States relies on too many countries to strive on its own. The debt we have is the consequence of our actions. Japan, china, and Saudi Arabia could destroy the United State’s economical being with the complete and total annihilation of our imports of oil and other important goods. Also, if Japan decided to cash in on our debt to them, so consequentially buy and own the United States.
Index of Economic Freedom and Annual Report
(Chapter 3 for
links to countries)
Q2- Name five
countries whose ranking surprised you.
1. Estonia
2. Taiwan
3. Saudi Arabia
4. Hong Kong
5. Luxemburg
Q3- Write one sentence each to explain why you chose the countries you did in Q2.
1. Estonia surprised me because the country is so small and insignificant that, to be honest, I don’t really know where Estonia is located. I mean I know that it is located around the same areas of Latvia and Lithuania but its exact location is questionable.
2. Taiwan is almost 100% controlled by China. The Taiwanese put their lives in their own hands by rebelling against China and asking to be independent.
3. Saudi Arabia contains 25% of all of the oil in the world. The only real reason that I would assume that they were under the mostly free category would be because of rights of the women. The women have no rights. Other than that, Saudi Arabia could control the whole world if they put effort into it.
4. Hong Kong is probably the most surprising of all. Hong Kong is located on the coast of China. China is a communist country that is mostly unfree. To have a “country” in china like that be number one is astonishing.
5. One the same little bit of Estonia, it to is a small and very insignificant country in Europe. How can it be in the top five when it doesn’t have any land mass, big population, or importing to countries. It doesn’t even have any oil.
Q4- The USA was not ranked first in any of the years exhibited online in the
Annual Report nor in the 2005 Index. List the twelve countries that ranked
higher on the Index and the countries that out ranked the USA in the eight
Annual Reports.
1. Hong Kong
2. Singapore
3. Luxemburg
4. Estonia
5. Ireland
6. New Zealand
7. United Kingdom
8. Denmark
9. Iceland
10. Australia
11. Chile
12. Switzerland
Q5- The Index uses 50 variables in 10 categories. The Report shows 21 variables in 5 categories and lists 24 sub-variables in its online charts.
In compliance to the answering of this question, it has proven to be very difficult and impossible given the knowledge capacity of my classmates and I, to figure out an answer. I am sorry for the inconvenience.