Americans are terrible at building transit infrastructure. They struggle to build basic metro extensions for the New York subway. California is still struggling to build high speed rail. Any infrastructure project is always extraordinarily expensive and slow.
Americans are terrible at urbanism. Their road design is a disaster.
American struggle at manufacturing. Their cars simply aren’t reliable. They are a joke. They struggle to make computer chips. Intel is failing. Both Biden and Trump asked TSMC to come to the US
Yet americans are exceptionally good at software
Why?
But how many are Americans (presumable some have gone out and gotten citizenship)? I think there is something to be said for the kind of people we attract to the country. Lots of them are really talented.