If the economy is so good, why do we feel so bad?(Forward Observer: Politics meets economics)

The global economy is roaring. "For the first time since 1969," newspapers recently reported, "not a single country in the world has had negative year-over-year growth."

Overall, the world economy is rising at a 4.4 percent rate, after inflation. At that pace, Gross Domestic Product doubles in 17 years, quadruples in less than a generation, and rises by a factor of about 30 in a lifetime. Imagine the average nation being 30 times richer than it is today!

It's no secret why this is happening. Nearly half the world's people--in places like China, India, and the former Soviet Union--have recently moved from economic systems that don't work (like autarchy or communism) toward free-market systems that do. These nations haven't fully embraced open, competitive enterprise systems with clear limits on government interference--but, then neither has Europe, or the United States for that matter. The vector of change, however, is clear, and a growing world economy is very, very good for us.

U.S. growth for 2005 was 3.5 percent--slower than the world as a whole but still quite brisk, and much brisker than most other developed countries--and the consensus of economists predicts roughly the same for the year ahead.

The results are staggering. In the past year, including modest inflation, America's output of goods and services has increased by nearly $1 trillion--or about $10,000 for every family. In the last five months alone, the U.S. has created 1 million net new jobs.

But if the U.S. economy is doing so well, why aren't Americans happier about it? Surveys show they are pretty miserable. Since January 2001, Gallup has been asking people, oil a monthly basis, how they "rate economic conditions in this country today--as excellent, good, only fair, or poor." Gallup also asks whether respondents think economic conditions "as a whole are getting better or worse."

With the results, Gallup creates three groups: positive Americans, who rank the economy as excellent or good and believe conditions are getting better or staying the same; negative Americans, who say conditions are fair or poor and staying the same or getting worse; and Americans with mixed views, who answer positively on one measurement and negatively oil another.