>> Because they built a society that can provide it. To everyone.

That society was built on exploiting global resources and issues eg: selling weapons for wars, extracting oil, gold and diamonds from countries with uneducated leaders, manufacturing stuff from countries where living wage is lower aka making lives worse.

Just think about it! When those other countries start becoming more and more educated and start turning things for their own good, this great American society is going to have to suffer.

Let's say there are two people (American and Chinese) in this world and one t-shirt manufactured. The American was always able to afford it. Now the Chinese can afford it and can outbid the American. Doesn't the standard of living of the American drop? Yes.

Economics doesn't work that way. The profit margins of the American capitalist may have been higher when the Chinese were poor, but actual total world productivity (the amount of stuff available to share around) has gone up as the Chinese have gotten richer. The development of the Third World is a positive-sum, ahaha, development.

Economics does work that. The amount of resources are limited by: a. Quantity of raw materials available for use b. Skill (labor and/or machines) to convert those raw materials into something useful.

So while America had a lot of a and b, the rest of the world is having that now too. So America has lesser of a and b as a proportion of total a an b