The economy will be in a depression. The energy supplies of the world may not be exhausted, but will be declining in output. This decline in supply coupled with a long term increase in demand, caused by the economic expansion of China and other countries, will raise the price of oil significantly. The rise of oil prices has had a significant impact on the US economy in the past, and will probably have the same effect in the future. Thus the US economy will probably be in depression or recession. The problem is that the US will increasingly not decreasingly be dependent on oil of energy.

From year 2005-2055 the economy will probably not pick up much. The population will be getting older, local governments will be going downhill, and the federal deficit will be far out of control. To combat the rising deficit there are two fiscal policy options, cut spending, or raise taxes. Since the economy is in recession, the usual policy is to spend more and cut taxes to stimulate growth. These two are in conflict. It is likely that spending will be cut more even more dramatically and that taxes will be raised for the working class.

The other reason the economy will be in recession is because of the lack of jobs. There will not be that many good jos in the US in the future. We are experiencing som of the effects of globalization today, but as the process moves on, the effects will get larger. When the playing field is made equal workers will have to compete with eachother, something that has been documented in some American histories. This will lead to a decline in working wages in America, but because of high tariffs and minimum wage laws here will not make more jobs. Therefore my generation and the next will have a very hard time getting jobs.

There will be more population migration within the US, more urbanization, and movement to the south and west. Which seeing as the population is getting older, makes sense, the weather is nicer. So more people will be moving into cities. People who live in cities are more likely to be liberal. They will also probably be richer. However the more people in a city the more polluted it gets. Another trend in the future is the expansion of the suburb, something that has been happening in the recent past. I believe that with rising oil prices cities will need to improve their public transportation, expanding it more into the suburbs. Suburbs are becomming poorer and poorer, at least in this city.

So what happens when more people move to places like the south and the west, moving out of manufacturing cities, �the rust belt�. Well it means that the local county, city and state governments will be in bad condition. Alabama had a problem with its budget a little while ago, they had to cut back funds to most of their police force and prison system. So thats what will happen to the countryside of America, fairly decrepit.