Berman Essay

Morris Berman"s ‘Twilight of American Culture" – Analysis
Morris Berman, author of the Twilight of American Culture believes that American civilization is on the verge of collapse. Berman states four factors which clearly explain the reason for the decline in American culture: accelerating social and economic inequality, declining marginal returns with regard to investment in organizational solutions to socioeconomic problems, rapidly dropping levels of literacy (critical understanding and general intellectual awareness) and lastly, spiritual death –emptying out of cultural content and the freezing of it in formulas.
The first factor, accelerating social and economic inequality, shows us that America is no longer a middle class society.   He discloses that no other major industrial nation has such a disparity of wealth as the United States.   To back up his statement, he presents the reader with statistical information.   The top 1 percent of the people own 47 percent of the nation"s wealth, and the top 20 percent owns 93 percent.   He also reveals that Bill Gates" net worth in 1998 was larger than the combined net worth of the bottom 40 percent of all American households.   Berman continues by saying that this inequality is global: "The wealth of America"s top quintile is implicated not only in the poverty of South Central Los Angeles but also in the slums of Buenos Aires".
The second factor is declining marginal returns with regard to investment in organizational solutions to socioeconomic problems.Berman analyzes statistics on Social Security, Medicare, the aging population ,declining birth rate and the national debt, Berman says that people cannot rely on economic growth and nor can they project it indefinitely, in the future. He thereby concludes "a structural crunch does seem likely sometime in the 21st century".
The third factor is rapidly dropping rates of literacy.   He states that roughly sixty percent of us have never read a book of any kind, and...