Prosperity vs. Sloth.(American people's tendency towards work and wealth )

Imagine you're a hard-working mid-level executive in a stress-packed job, and you suddenly inherit a few million bucks. What do you do?

Economists have discovered that recipients of windfalls (bequests or lottery winnings) use their new wealth to purchase a delightful commodity: leisure.

"What we found" says Harvey Rosen of Princeton, former chairman of President Bush's Council of Economic Advisors, "was that the more money you get thrown at you, the more likely you are to get out of the workforce. And, if you stay in the workforce, you work less."

Economists can be masters of the obvious, but let's take the finding a step further: In 1930, John Maynard Keynes wrote an essay, "Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren." He pointed out that in the entire scope of human history before 1700, the standard of living of the average person had hardly budged. Over the next 230 years, the increase was about half a percentage point annually. For the century ahead, Keynes predicted, living standards would at least quadruple and, as he put it, "the economic problem may be solved."

Samuel Brittain calculated a few years ago in the Financial Times that GDP per capita in the U.K. had increased 3.8 times in the 70 years since Keynes's forecast. Similar growth occurred in the rest of Europe, the U.S., and Japan, and there's no doubt that Keynes will exceed his target in another 25 years.

In developed nations, individuals are far, far richer than they used to be and have all the comforts they need. It's as if they received big inheritances. It stands to reason, then, that the people of prosperous nations will work less hard and that the annual growth of GDP will decline.

It appears that just this sort of complacency has taken hold in what Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld deemed Old Europe: France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, and a few others. Japan, as well, may be classified as economically complacent.