On Monday, February 3, the State of the Nation Project, a politically diverse committee of experts who together have advised each of the past five presidents, released its inaugural "State of the Nation" report to shed light on how the United States is doing in key areas.
The report’s launch event in Washington DC, co-hosted by The Murphy Institute, The Brookings Institution, and the American Enterprise Institute, provided attendees with the opportunity to engage with the authors of the report as they discussed the findings of the State of the Nation Project, the challenges facing the nation, and progress made so far.
The report, funded by The Murphy Institute, tracks 37 measures across 15 topics — economic output, employment, income inequality, life expectancy, environmental conditions, depression, community involvement, press freedom, and voter turnout — compared to historical trends and peer countries. For a measure to make the list, roughly 75 percent of the experts had to agree on its inclusion.
The report found stark contrasts in the nation’s global standing in key indicators. The United States excels economically and is improving in poverty reduction. Yet it lags other high-income nations in mental health, life satisfaction, citizenship and democracy, income inequality, trust in institutions, and rates of violence. The country is doing extremely well in some areas and extremely poorly in many others.
The group also commissioned a poll and found that a large majority of Americans agreed about the importance of most topics. While there were some differences of opinion, the overall findings from the report’s authors are largely consistent with the public’s views. So, while the report shows a growing dislike for opposing political parties, the various sides actually agree on more than they think. This realization provides hope for the potential to make tangible progress, according to State of the Nation Project Director Douglas Harris, Murphy professor and chair of economics at Tulane University.
The full report and a detailed breakdown of the findings are available at stateofnation.org.
