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United States of America
Flag Great Seal
Motto:  Error: {{Lang}}: text has italic markup (help) (traditional) In God We Trust (official, 1956–present)
Anthem: "The Star-Spangled Banner"
Capital	Washington, D.C.
Largest city	New York City
Official languages	None at the federal level; English de facto
Government	Federal republic
• President	George W. Bush
• Vice President	Dick Cheney
Independence From Great Britain
• Declared	July 4 1776
• Recognized	September 3, 1783
• Water (%)	4.87
Population
• 2006 estimate	338,968,000 (3rd)
• 2000 census	281,421,906
GDP (PPP)	2006 estimate
• Total	$13.049 trillion (1st)
• Per capita	$43,555 (3rd)
HDI (2003)	0.944 very high (10th)
Currency	United States dollar ($) (USD)
Time zone	UTC-5 to -10
• Summer (DST)	UTC-4 to -10
Calling code	1
ISO 3166 code	US
Internet TLD	.us .gov .edu .mil .um
1.) Area rank is disputed with China and sometimes is ranked 3rd or 4th.

The United States of America (also known as the United States, the U.S., the U.S.A., the U.S. of A., and America) is a country in North America that extends from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and shares land borders with Canada and Mexico and a sea border with Russia. The United States is a federal republic, with its capital in Washington, D.C.

The present-day continental United States has been inhabited for at least 15,000 years by indigenous tribes. After European exploration and settlement in the 16th century, the English established their own colonies—and gained control of others that had been begun by other European nations—in the eastern portion of the continent in the 17th and early 18th centuries. On July 4 1776, at war with Britain over fair governance, thirteen of these colonies declared their independence. In 1783, the war ended in British acceptance of the new nation. Since then, the United States of America has more than quadrupled in size: it now consists of 50 states and one federal district; it also has numerous overseas territories.

At over 3.7 million square miles (over 9.5 million km²), the U.S. is the third or fourth largest country by total area, depending on whether China's figures include its disputed areas. It is the world's third most populous nation, with over 300 million people.

The date of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, is generally considered to be the date on which the U.S. was founded. The first federal government was constituted under the Articles of Confederation, adopted in 1781. The Articles were replaced by the Constitution, adopted in 1787. Since its establishment, the liberal democratic nature of the government has grown as suffrage has been extended to more citizens. American military, economic, cultural, and political influence increased throughout the 20th century. With the collapse of the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War, the nation emerged as the world's sole remaining superpower. Today, the United States plays a major role in world affairs.

Name

See also: List of meanings of countries' names

The earliest known use of the name America is from 1507, when a globe and a large map created by the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller in Saint-Die-des-Vosges described the combined continents of North and South America. Although the origin of the name is uncertain, the most widely held belief is that expressed in an accompanying book, Cosmographiae Introductio, which explains it as a feminized version of the Latin name of Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci (Americus Vespucius); in Latin, the other continents' names were all feminine. Vespucci theorized, correctly, that Christopher Columbus, on reaching islands in the Caribbean Sea in 1492, had come not to India but to a "New World".

The Americas were also known as Columbia, after Columbus, prompting the name District of Columbia for the land set aside as the U.S. capital. Columbia remained a popular name for the United States until the early 20th century, when it fell into relative disuse; but it is still used poetically and appears in various names and titles. One female personification of the country is called Columbia; she is similar to Britannia. Columbus Day is a holiday in the U.S. and other countries in the Americas commemorating Columbus' October 1492 landing.

The term "united States of America" was first used officially in the Declaration of Independence, adopted on July 4 1776. On November 15 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, the first of which stated "The Stile of this Confederacy shall be 'The United States of America.'"

The adjectival and demonymic forms for the United States are American, a point of controversy among some, particularly Latin Americans.

Geography

The United States is the world's third largest country by land area, after Russia and Canada. Its contiguous portion is bounded by the North Atlantic Ocean to the east, the North Pacific Ocean to the west, Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Canada to the north. The state of Alaska also borders Canada, with the Pacific Ocean to its south and the Arctic Ocean to its north. West of Alaska, across the narrow Bering Strait, is Russia. The state of Hawaii occupies an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean, southwest of the North American mainland.

Terrain

The U.S. has an extremely varied geography, particularly in the West. The eastern seaboard has a coastal plain which is widest in the south and narrows in the north. The coastal plain does not exist north of New Jersey, although there are glacial outwash plains on Long Island, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket. In the extreme southeast, Florida is home to the ecologically unique Everglades.

Beyond the coastal plain, the rolling hills of the piedmont region end at the Appalachian Mountains, which rise above 6,000 feet (1,830 m) in North Carolina, Tennessee, and New Hampshire. From the west slope of the Appalachians, the Interior Plains of the Midwest are relatively flat and are the location of the Great Lakes as well as the Mississippi-Missouri River, the world's 4th longest river system. West of the Mississippi River, the Interior Plains slope uphill and blend into the vast and often featureless Great Plains.

The abrupt rise of the Rocky Mountains, at the western edge of the Great Plains, extends north to south across the continental U.S., reaching altitudes over 14,000 feet (4,270 m) in Colorado. In the past, the Rocky Mountains had a higher level of volcanic activity; nowadays, the range only has one area of volcanism (the supervolcano underlying Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, possibly the world's largest volcano), although rift volcanism has occurred relatively recently near the Rockies' southern margin in New Mexico. Dozens of high mountain ranges, salt flats such as the Bonneville Salt Flats, and valleys are found in the Great Basin region located west of the Rockies and east of the Sierra Nevada, which also has deep chasms, including the Snake River. At the southwestern end of the Great Basin, Death Valley lies 282 feet (86 m) below sea level, the second lowest dry land on Earth. It is the lowest point in the Western Hemisphere and is situated near the Mojave Desert.

North of the Great Basin and east of the Cascade Range in the Northwest is the Columbia River Plateau, a large igneous province shaped by one of the largest flood basalts on Earth. It is marked by dark black rocks. Surrounding the Four Corners region lies the Colorado Plateau, named after the Colorado River, which flows through it. The Plateau is generally high in elevation, has highly eroded sandstone, and the soil is a blood red in some locations. Many national parks, such as Arches, Bryce Canyon, Grand Canyon, and Zion are in the area. West of the Great Basin, the Sierra Nevada mountain range has Mount Whitney, the highest peak in the coterminous U.S. Along the Pacific coast, the Coast Ranges and the volcanic Cascade Range extend from north to south across the country. The northwestern Pacific coast shares the world's largest temperate rain forest with Canada.

Alaska has numerous mountain ranges, including Mount McKinley (Denali), the highest peak in North America. Numerous volcanoes can be found throughout the Alexander and Aleutian Islands extending south and west of the Alaskan mainland.

The Hawaiian islands are tropical, volcanic islands extending over 1,500 miles (2,400 km), and consisting of six larger islands and another dozen smaller ones that are inhabited.

Climate

The climate of the U.S. is as varied as its landscape. In northern Alaska, tundra and arctic conditions predominate, and the temperature has fallen as low as minus 80 °F (−62 °C). On the other end of the spectrum, Death Valley, California once reached 134 °F (56.7 °C), the second-highest temperature ever recorded on Earth.

On average, the mountains of the western states receive the highest levels of snowfall on Earth. The greatest annual snowfall level is at Mount Rainier in Washington, at 692 inches (1,758 cm); the record there was 1,122 inches (2,850 cm) in the winter of 1971–72. Other places with significant snowfall outside the Cascade Range are the Wasatch Mountains, near the Great Salt Lake, and the Sierra Nevada, near Lake Tahoe. In the east, while snowfall does not approach western levels, the region near the Great Lakes and the mountains of the Northeast receive the most. Along the northwestern Pacific coast, rainfall is greater than anywhere else in the continental U.S., with Quinault Ranger in Washington having an average of 137 inches (348 cm). Hawaii receives even more, with 460 inches (1,168 cm) measured annually on Mount Waialeale, in Kauai. The Mojave Desert, in the southwest, is home to the driest locale in the U.S. Yuma Valley, Arizona, has an average of 2.63 inches (6.68 cm) of precipitation each year.

In central portions of the U.S., tornadoes are more common than anywhere else on Earth and touch down most commonly in the spring and summer. Deadly and destructive hurricanes occur almost every year along the Atlantic seaboard and the Gulf of Mexico. The Appalachian region and the Midwest experience the worst floods, though virtually no area in the U.S. is immune to flooding. The Southwest has the worst droughts; one is thought to have lasted over 500 years and to have decimated the Anasazi people. The West is affected by large wildfires each year.

History

Native Americans

Before the European colonization of the Americas, a process that began at the end of the 15th century, the present-day continental U.S. was inhabited exclusively by various indigenous tribes, including Alaskan natives, who migrated to the continent over a period that may have begun 35,000 years ago and may have ended as recently as 11,000 years ago.

European colonization

The first confirmed European landing in the present-day United States was by Spaniard Juan Ponce de Leon, who landed in 1513 in Florida, and as part of his claim, the first European settlement was established by Don Pedro Menendez de Aviles on the site of a Timucuan Indian village in 1565 at St. Augustine, Florida. The French colonized some of the northeastern portions, and the Spanish colonized most of the southern and western United States. The first successful English settlement was at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607, followed in 1620 by the Pilgrims' landing at Plymouth, Massachusetts, and then the arrival of the colony of Massachusetts Bay, started by the Puritans. In 1609 and 1617, respectively, the Dutch settled in part of what became New York and New Jersey. In 1638, the Swedes founded New Sweden, in part of what became Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania after passing through Dutch hands. Throughout the 17th and early 18th centuries, England (and later Great Britain) established new colonies, took over Dutch colonies, and split others. With the division of the Carolinas in 1729, and the colonization of Georgia in 1732, the British colonies in North America—excluding present-day Canada—numbered thirteen.

American Revolution

Tensions between American colonials and the British during the revolutionary period of the 1760s and 1770s led to open military conflict in 1775. The British Colonies of East and West Florida and Quebec did not join in the rebellion against Great Britain. George Washington commanded the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) as the Second Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The Second Continental Congress had been formed to confront British actions and created the Continental Army, but it did not have the authority to levy taxes or make federal laws. In 1777, the Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation, uniting the states under a weak federal government, which operated from 1781 until 1788, when enough states had ratified the United States Constitution. The Constitution, which strengthened the union and the federal government, has since remained the supreme law of the land.

Following the war, United Empire Loyalists, soldiers and civilians, were evacuated from the colonies and resettled in other colonies of the British Empire, most notably to Quebec, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland in what is now Canada.

Westward expansion

From 1803 to 1848, the size of the new nation nearly tripled as settlers (many embracing the concept of Manifest Destiny as an inevitable consequence of American exceptionalism) pushed beyond national boundaries even before the Louisiana Purchase. The expansion was tempered somewhat by the stalemate in the War of 1812, but it was subsequently reinvigorated by victory in the Mexican-American War in 1848.

Civil War

As new territories were being incorporated, the nation was divided over the issue of states' rights, the role of the federal government, and—by the 1820s—the expansion of slavery, which had been legal in all thirteen colonies but was rarer in the north, where it was abolished by 1804. The Northern states were opposed to the expansion of slavery whereas the Southern states saw the opposition as an attack on their way of life, since their economy was dependent on slave labor. The failure to permanently resolve these issues led to the Civil War, following the secession of many slave states in the South to form the Confederate States of America after the 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln. The 1865 Union victory in the Civil War effectively ended slavery and settled the question of whether a state had the right to secede. The event was a major turning point in American history, with an increase in federal power.

Reconstruction and industrialization

After the Civil War, an unprecedented influx of immigrants, who helped to provide labor for American industry and create diverse communities in undeveloped areas—together with high tariff protections, national infrastructure building, and national banking regulations—hastened the country's rise to international power. The growing power of the United States enabled it to acquire new territories, including the annexation of Puerto Rico after victory in the Spanish-American War, which marked the debut of the United States as a major world power.

World War I and II

At the start of the First World War in 1914, the United States remained neutral. In 1917, however, the United States joined the Allied Powers, helping to turn the tide against the Central Powers. For historical reasons, American sympathies were very much in favor of the British and French, even though a sizable number of citizens, mostly Irish and German, were opposed to intervention. After the war, the Senate did not ratify the Treaty of Versailles because of a fear that it would pull the United States into European affairs. Instead, the country pursued a policy of unilateralism that bordered at times on isolationism.

During most of the 1920s, the United States enjoyed a period of unbalanced prosperity as farm prices fell and industrial profits grew. A rise in debt and an inflated stock market culminated in a crash in 1929, triggering the Great Depression. After his election as President in 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt instituted his plan for a New Deal, which increased government intervention in the economy in response to the Great Depression.

The nation did not fully recover until 1941, when the United States was driven to join the Allies against the Axis Powers after a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor by Japan. World War II was the costliest war in American history, but it helped to pull the economy out of depression because the required production of military materiel provided much-needed jobs, and women entered the workforce in large numbers for the first time. During this war, scientists working for the United States federal government succeeded in producing nuclear weapons, making the United States the world's first nuclear power. Toward the end of World War II, after the end of World War II in Europe, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. Japan surrendered soon after, on 2 September 1945, which ended World War II.

Cold War and civil rights

After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union became superpowers in an era of ideological rivalry dubbed the Cold War. The United States promoted liberal democracy and capitalism, while the Soviet Union communism and a centrally planned economy. The result was a series of proxy wars, including the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the tense nuclear showdown of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the Soviet war in Afghanistan.

The perception that the United States was losing the space race spurred government efforts to raise proficiency in mathematics and science in schools and led to President John F. Kennedy's call for the United States to land "a man on the moon" by the end of the 1960s, which was realized in 1969.

Meanwhile, American society experienced a period of sustained economic expansion. At the same time, discrimination across the United States, especially in the South, was increasingly challenged by a growing civil-rights movement headed by prominent African Americans such as Martin Luther King, Jr., which led to the abolition of the Jim Crow laws in the South.

After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States continued to intervene militarily overseas, for example in the Gulf War. It remains the worlds only Superpower.

September 11, 2001 and the War on Terrorism

On September 11 2001, 19 al-Qaeda operatives hijacked four commercial airplanes and flew two planes into the World Trade Center towers, one plane into the The Pentagon, and the fourth plane was brought down by passengers in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. After the 9/11 attacks U.S. foreign policy then focused on the global threat of terrorism. In response, the United States government under President George W. Bush began a series of military and legal operations termed the War on Terror. The War on Terror began on October 7, 2001 when a U.S.-led coalition launched military operations in Afghanistan which led to the removal of the Taliban rule and the expulsion of the terrorist organization al-Qaeda and its leader Osama Bin Laden. The events of September 11 led to a preemptive policy against threats to U.S. security, known as the Bush Doctrine.

In the 2002 State of the Union President George Bush labeled North Korea, Iraq, and Iran "the axis of evil," and stated that these countries "constitute a grave threat to the security of the U.S. and its allies." Beginning later that year, the Bush administration began to press for regime change in the rogue state of Iraq. After many failed U.N. resolutions and Saddam Hussien rejecting demands to surrender, the United States and its allies invaded Iraq in March of 2003. The Bush administration justified its invasion with a charge that Iraq had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction, and was seeking nuclear weapons. After the invasion only a limited number of non-nuclear stockpiles were found, and the Bush administration later admitted having acted on flawed intelligence. As of October 2006, the Iraq War remains an ongoing event.

Government and politics

The United States is the longest-surviving extant constitutional republic, with the oldest wholly written constitution in the world. Its government operates as a representative democracy through a congressional system under a set of powers specified by its Constitution. There are three levels of government: federal, state, and local. Officials at all three levels are either elected by voters in a secret ballot or appointed by other elected officials. Executive and legislative offices are decided by a plurality vote of citizens in their respective districts, with judicial and cabinet-level offices nominated by the Executive branch and approved by the Legislature. In some states, judicial posts are filled by popular election rather than executive appointment.

The federal government comprises three branches, which are designed to check and balance one another's powers:

• Legislative: The Congress, made up of the Senate and the House of Representatives, which makes federal law, declares war, approves treaties and has powers of impeachment.
• Executive: The President, who appoints, with Senate approval, the Cabinet and other officers, who administers and enforces federal law, can veto bills, and acts the supreme commander in times of war and national emergency.
• Judiciary: The Supreme Court and lower federal courts, whose judges are appointed by the President with Senate approval, that interpret laws and their validity under the Constitution, and can overturn laws they deem unconstitutional.

The United States Congress is a bicameral legislature. The House has 435 members, each representing a congressional district for a two-year term. House seats are apportioned among the states according to population every tenth year. Each state is guaranteed at least one representative: currently, seven states have one each; California, the most populous state, has 53. Each state has two senators, elected at large to six-year terms; one third of Senate seats are up for election every second year.

Under the country's federal system, the relationship between the state and national governments is complex; under U.S. law, states are considered sovereign entities. However, the American Civil War and Texas v. White established that states do not have the right to secede, and, under the Constitution, they are not allowed to conduct foreign policy. Federal law overrides state law in the areas in which the federal government is empowered to act; but the powers of the federal government are subject to limits outlined in the Constitution. All powers not granted to the federal government in the Constitution are left to the states or the people themselves. However, the "Necessary and Proper" and "Commerce" clauses of the Constitution legally allow the extension of federal powers into other affairs, though this is the topic of considerable debate over states' rights.

The United States Constitution is the supreme legal document in the American system, and serves as a social contract between the people of the United States and their government. All laws and procedures of both state and federal governments are subject to review, and any law ruled to violate the Constitution by the judicial branch is overturned. The Constitution is a living document. It can be amended by a variety of methods, all of which require the approval of an overwhelming majority of the states. The Constitution has been amended 27 times, the last time in 1992.

The Constitution contains a dedication to "preserve liberty" with a "Bill of Rights" and other amendments, which guarantee freedom of speech, religion, and the press; the right to a fair trial; the right to keep and bear arms; universal suffrage; and property rights. However, the extent to which these rights are protected and universal in practice is heavily debated. The Constitution also guarantees to every State "a Republican Form of Government". However, the meaning of that guarantee has been only slightly explicated.

There are two major political parties: the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. The Republicans are generally socially conservative and economically classical-liberals with some right-leaning centrists. The Democrats are generally socially liberal and economically progressive with some left-leaning centrists. Growing numbers of Americans identify with neither party—with some claiming the title Independent and others joining emerging parties, including the Green, Libertarian, and Reform parties. Except for a Democrat plurality in the Senate in 2001–02, the Republican Party has held the majority in both houses of Congress since the 1994 elections; since 2001, the President has been George W. Bush, a Republican.

Foreign relations and military

The United States has vast economic, political, and military influence on a global scale, which makes its foreign policy a subject of great interest and discussion around the world. Almost all countries have embassies in Washington, D.C., and consulates around the country. However, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Sudan do not have formal diplomatic relations with the United States. The United States is a founding member of the United Nations (with a permanent seat on the Security Council), among many other international organizations.

In 1949, in an effort to contain communism during the Cold War, the United States, Canada, and ten Western European nations formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, a mutual-defense alliance in which they have since been joined by 14 other European states—including Turkey, which straddles the Eurasian border, and some former Soviet states. In an example of realpolitik, the United States also established diplomatic relations with Communist countries that were antagonistic to the Soviet Union, like the People's Republic of China during the Sino-Soviet split. Recently, the foreign policy of the United States has focused on combating terrorism as well as the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Other transnational issues include immigration reform and the shipment of illegal drugs into the country.

The United States has a long-standing tradition of civilian control over military affairs. The Department of Defense administers the U.S. armed forces, which comprise the Army, the Navy, the Marine Corps, and the Air Force. The Coast Guard falls under the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security in peacetime but is placed under the Department of the Navy in times of war.

The military of the United States comprises 1.4 million personnel on active duty, along with several hundred thousand each in the Reserves and the National Guard. Service in the military is voluntary, though conscription may occur in times of war through the Selective Service System. The United States is considered to have the most powerful military in the world, partly because of the size of its defense budget; American defense expenditures in 2005 were estimated to be greater than the next 14 largest national military budgets combined, even though the U.S. military budget is only about 4% of the country's gross domestic product. The U.S. military maintains over 700 bases and facilities on every continent except Antarctica.

The American military is committed to having a technological edge over its potential enemies and has an extensive research program to maintain such an edge. Defense-related research over the years yielded such major breakthroughs as space exploration, the Internet, nuclear power, the Global Positioning System, stealth aircraft, "smart" weapons, better bullet-proof vests, microwaves, and more recently ground-based lasers intended to target and destroy inbound missiles. These force multipliers have traditionally borne more materiel expense than personnel expense. Military technology maintains a close relationship with the civilian economy and has contributed to general technological and economic development of the United States, and often, via technology transfer, other countries as well. Conversely, the military has also benefited from the American civilian infrastructure.

Administrative divisions

The conterminous, or contiguous, forty-eight states—all the states but Alaska and Hawaii—are also called the continental United States. Some include Alaska in the "continental" states, because, although it is separated from the "lower forty-eight" by Canada, it is part of the North American mainland. All of these terms commonly include the District of Columbia. Hawaii, the fiftieth state, occupies an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean.

The United States also holds several other territories, districts, and possessions, notably the federal district of the District of Columbia—which contains the nation's capital city, Washington—and several overseas insular areas, the most significant of which are American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the United States Virgin Islands. Palmyra Atoll is the United States' only incorporated territory; but it is unorganized and uninhabited. The United States Minor Outlying Islands consist of uninhabited islands and atolls in the Pacific and Caribbean Sea. In addition, since 1898, the United States Navy has leased an extensive naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Former U.S. possessions include the Panama Canal Zone, which was a U.S. territory from 1903 until 1979. Additionally, the Philippine Islands were American territory from 1898 until 1935, when the United States established the Commonwealth of the Philippines as a transition between territorial status and full Philippine independence, which occurred in 1946. Because it was part of the United States at the time of World War II, the Philippines is the only independent nation with a memorial pillar at the National World War II Memorial in Washington, DC.

In addition to the actual states and territories of the United States, there are also nations which are associated states of the U.S. The Federated States of Micronesia (since 1986), Palau (since 1994), and the Marshall Islands (since 1986) are associated with the United States under what is known as the Compact of Free Association, giving the states international sovereignty and ultimate control over their territory. However, the governments of those areas have agreed to allow the United States to provide defense and financial assistance. The U.S. also treats these nations uniquely by giving them access to many U.S. domestic programs, including disaster response and recovery and hazard mitigation programs under FEMA. The freely associated states are all dependent on U.S. financial assistance to meet both government operational and capital needs. The Office of Insular Affairs administers this financial assistance. The freely associated states also actively participate in all Office of Insular Affairs technical assistance activities. Together with the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, each of these associated states were once part of the U.S.-administered UN Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, which existed from 1947 until 1986 in the case of the Marshall Islands, the Northern Marianas, and the Federated States of Micronesia; Palau's trusteeship ended in 1994.

Ecology

Flora and fauna

The U.S. has over 17,000 identified native plant and tree species, including 5,000 just in California (which is home to the tallest, the most massive, and the oldest trees in the world). With habitats ranging from tropical to arctic, the flora of the U.S. is the most diverse of any country; yet, thousands of non-native exotic species sometimes adversely affect indigenous plant and animal communities. Over 400 species of mammal, 700 species of bird, 500 species of reptile and amphibian, and 90,000 species of insect have been documented. Many plants and animals are very localized in their distribution, and some are in danger of extinction. The U.S. passed the Endangered Species Act in 1973 to protect native plant and animal species and their habitats.

Conservation has a long history in the U.S.; in 1872, the world's first National Park was established at Yellowstone. Another 57 national parks and hundreds of other federally managed parks and forests have since been designated. In some parts of the country, wilderness areas have been established to ensure long-term protection of pristine habitats. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service monitors endangered and threatened species and has set aside numerous areas for species and habitat preservation. Altogether, the U.S. government regulates 1,020,779 square miles (2,643,807 km²), which is 28.8% of the total land area of the U.S. The bulk of this land is protected park and forestland, but some is leased for oil and gas exploration, mining, and cattle ranching.

Economy

The economic history of the United States is a story of economic growth that began with marginally successful colonial economies and progressed to the largest industrial economy in the world in the 20th and early 21st century.

The economic system of the United States can be described as a capitalist mixed economy, in which corporations, other private firms, and individuals make most microeconomic decisions, and governments prefer to take a smaller role in the domestic economy, although the combined role of all levels of government is relatively large, at 36% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The U.S. has a small social safety net, and regulation of businesses is slightly less than the average of developed countries. The United States' median household income in 2005 was $43,318.

Economic activity varies greatly across the country. For example, New York City is the center of the American financial, publishing, broadcasting, and advertising industries, while Los Angeles is the most important center for film and television production. The San Francisco Bay Area and the Pacific Northwest are major centers for technology. The Midwest is known for its reliance on manufacturing and heavy industry, with Detroit serving as the historic center of the American automotive industry, and Chicago serving as the business and financial capital of the region. The Southeast is a major area for agriculture, tourism, and the lumber industry, and, because of wages and costs below the national average, it continues to attract manufacturing.

The largest sector in the United States economy is services, which employs roughly three quarters of the work force.

The economy is fueled by an abundance in natural resources such as coal, petroleum, and precious metals. However, the country still depends for much of its energy on foreign countries. In agriculture, the country is a top producer of corn, soy beans, rice, and wheat, with the Great Plains labeled as the "breadbasket of the world" for its tremendous agricultural output. The U.S. has a large tourist industry, ranking third in the world, and is also a major exporter in goods such as airplanes, steel, weapons, and electronics. Canada accounts for 19% (more than any other nation) of the United States' foreign trade, followed by China, Mexico, and Japan.

While the per capita income of the United States is among the highest in the world, the wealth is comparatively concentrated, with approximately 40% of the population earning less than an average resident of western Europe and the top 20% earning substantially more. Since 1975, the U.S. has a "two-tier" labor market in which virtually all the real income gains have gone to the top 20% of households. This polarization is the result of a relatively high level of economic freedom.

The social mobility of U.S. residents relative to that of other countries is the subject of much debate. Some analysts have found that social mobility in the United States is low relative to other OECD states, specifically compared to Western Europe, Scandinavia and Canada. Low social mobility may stem in part from the U.S. educational system. Public education in the United States is funded mainly by local property taxes supplemented by state revenues. This frequently results in a wide difference in funding between poor districts or poor states and more affluent jurisdictions. In addition, the practice of legacy preference at elite universities gives preference to the children of alumni, who are often wealthy. This practice reduces available spaces for better-qualified lower income students. Some analysts argue that relative social mobility in the U.S. peaked in the 1960s and declined rapidly beginning in the 1980s. Former Federal Reserve Board Chairman Alan Greenspan has also suggested that that the growing income inequality and low class mobility of the U.S. economy may eventually threaten the entire system in the near future.

Innovation

The United States is an influential country in scientific and technological research and the production of innovative technological products. During World War II, the U.S. was the first to develop the atomic bomb, ushering in the atomic age. Beginning early the Cold War, the U.S. achieved successes in space science and technology, leading to a space race which led to rapid advances in rocketry, weaponry, material science, computers, and many other areas. This technological progress was epitomized by the first visit of a man to the moon, when Neil Armstrong stepped off of Apollo 11 in July 1969. The U.S. was also the most instrumental nation in the development of the Internet, developing its predecessor, Arpanet. The U.S. also controls most of its infrastructure.

In the sciences, Americans have a large share of Nobel Prizes, especially in the fields of physiology and medicine. The National Institutes of Health, a focal point for biomedical research in the United States, has contributed to the completion of the Human Genome Project. The main governmental organization for aviation and space research is the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Major corporations, such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin, also play an important role.

Transit

The automobile industry developed earlier and more rapidly in the United States than in most other countries. The backbone of the nation's transportation infrastructure is a network of high-capacity highways. From data taken in 2004, there are about 3,981,521 miles (6,407,637 km) of roadways in the U.S., the most in the world.

Mass transit systems exist in large cities, such as New York, which operates one of the busiest subway systems in the world. With a few exceptions, American cities are less dense than those in other parts of the world. Low density partly results from and largely necessitates automobile ownership by most households.

Whereas the freight rail network is among the world's best (and most congested), the passenger rail network is underdeveloped by European and Japanese standards. This is partly because of the longer distances traveled in the U.S.; a destination two thousand miles (3,000 km) away is reached more quickly by air than by rail. Government subsidies of air travel played a role in the bankruptcy of passenger-rail corporations in the 1970s. The U.S. had been unique in its high number of private passenger railroads. During the 1970s, government intervention reorganized freight railroads. The passenger service was consolidated under the government-backed corporation Amtrak. No other country has more miles of rail than the U.S.

Air travel is the preferred means of travel for long distances. In terms of passengers, seventeen of the world's thirty busiest airports in 2004 were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport (ATL). In terms of cargo, in the same year, twelve of the world's thirty busiest airports were in the U.S., including the world's busiest, Memphis International Airport.

Several major seaports are in the United States; the three busiest are California's Port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach, and the Port of New York and New Jersey, all among the world's busiest. The interior of the U.S. also has a major shipping channel, via the St. Lawrence Seaway and the Mississippi River. The first water link between the Great Lakes and the Atlantic, the Erie Canal, allowed the rapid expansion of agriculture and industry in the Midwest and made New York City the economic center of the U.S.

Demographics

On October 172006 at 7:46 a.m. EST, the United States' population stood at an estimated 300,000,000, with an annual growth rate of about 0.59%. This figure includes persons living in the U.S. without legal permission to do so, estimated at 12 million, and excludes U.S. citizens living abroad, estimated at 3 million to 7 million. Thus any population estimate needs to be seen as a somewhat rough figure, according to the US Departement of Commerce. According to the 2000 census, about 79% of the population lived in urban areas.

About 15.8% of households have annual incomes of at least $100,000, and the top 10% of households had annual gross incomes exceeding $118,200 in 2003. Overall, the top quintile, those households earning more than $86,867 a year, earned 49.8% of all income in 2003.

In the 2000 census, the country had 31 ethnic groups with at least one million members each, with numerous others represented in smaller amounts. By the federal government's categorization of race, most Americans (80.4% in 2004) are white. These white Americans are mostly European Americans—the descendants of European immigrants to the United States—along with some non-Europeans counted as white in government nomenclature (those with origins in the original peoples of the Middle East and North Africa). To the exclusion of Hispanic-origin European Americans, non-Hispanic whites constituted 67.4% of the population. The non-Hispanic white population is proportionally declining, because of both immigration by, and a higher birth rate among, ethnic and racial minorities. If current immigration trends continue, the number of non-Hispanic whites is expected to be reduced to a plurality by 2040-2050. The largest ethnic group of European ancestry is German at 15.2%, followed by Irish (10.8%), English (8.7%), Italian (5.6%) and Scandinavian (3.7%). Many immigrants also hail from French Canada, as well as from such Slavic countries as Poland and Russia. African Americans, or Blacks, largely descend from Africans who arrived as slaves during the 17th through 19th centuries, and number about 35 million or 12.9% of the population. At about 1.5% of the total population, Native Americans and Alaska Natives number about 4.4 million, approximately 35% of whom were living on reservations in 2005.

Current demographic trends include the immigration of Hispanics from Latin America into the Southwest, a region that is home to about 60% of the 35 million Hispanics in the United States. Immigrants from Mexico make up about 66% of the Hispanic community, and are second only to the German-descent population in the single-ethnicity category. The Hispanic population, which has been growing at an annual rate of about 4.46% since the 1990s, is expected to increase significantly in the coming decades, because of both immigration and a higher birth rate among Latinos than among the general population.

Largest cities

The United States has dozens of major cities, which play an important role in U.S. culture, heritage, and economy. In 2004, 251 incorporated places had populations of at least 100,000 and nine had populations greater than 1,000,000, including several important global cities, such as New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago. In addition, there are fifty metropolitan areas with populations over 1,000,000.

Indigenous peoples

The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 gave United States citizenship to Native Americans, in part because of an interest by many to see them merged with the American mainstream, and also because of the heroic service of many Native American veterans in the First World War.

According to the 2003 census estimates, there are 2,786,652 Native Americans in the United States. However, numerous indigenous peoples from Latin American countries, particularly Mexico, have migrated to the U.S. over the years.

Language

Although the United States has no official language, English is the de facto national language. In 2003, about 214.8 million, or 81.6%, of the population aged five years and older spoke only English at home. Although not all Americans speak English, it is the most common language for daily interaction among both native and non-native speakers. Knowledge of English is required of immigrants seeking naturalization. Some Americans advocate making English the official language, which is the law in twenty-seven states. Three states also grant official status to other languages alongside English: French in Louisiana, Hawaiian in Hawaii, and Spanish in New Mexico. Besides English, languages spoken at home by at least one million Americans aged five years and up are Spanish or Spanish Creole, spoken by 29.7 million; Chinese, 2.2 million; French (including Patois and Cajun), 1.4 million; Tagalog, 1.3 million; Vietnamese, 1.1 million; and German, 1.1 million.

Religion

The United States government keeps no official register of Americans' religious status. However, in a private survey conducted in 2001 and mentioned in the Census Bureau's Statistical Abstract of the United States, 76.7% of American adults identified themselves as Christian; about 52% of adults described themselves as members of various Protestant denominations, including The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (1.3%); Roman Catholics, at 24.5%, were the most populous individual sect. Judaism (1.4%) and other faiths also have firm places in American culture. About 14.2% of respondents described themselves as having no religion. The religious distribution of the 5.4% who elected not to describe themselves for the survey is unknown.

Religion among some Americans is highly dynamic: over the period 1990–2001, those groups whose portion of the population at least doubled were, in descending order of growth, Wiccans, nondenominational Christians, Deists, Sikhs, Evangelical Christians, Disciples of Christ, New Age adherents, Hindus, Full Gospel adherents, Quakers, Bahá'ís, independent Christians, those who refused to answer the question, Buddhists, and Foursquare Gospel adherents.

Education

Education in the United States has been a state or local, not federal, responsibility. The Department of Education of the federal government, however, exerts some influence through its ability to control funding. Students are generally obliged to attend school starting with kindergarten, and ending with the 12th grade, which is normally completed at age 18, but many states may allow students to drop out as early as age 16. Besides public schools, parents may also choose to educate their own children at home or to send their children to parochial or private schools. After high school, students may choose to attend universities, either public or private. Public universities receive funding from the federal and state governments, as well as from other sources, but most students still have to pay student loans after graduation. Tuition at private universities is generally much higher than at public universities.

There are many competitive institutions of higher education in the United States, both private and public. The United States has 168 universities in the world's top 500, 17 of which are in the top 20. There are also many smaller universities and liberal arts colleges, and local community colleges of varying quality across the country with open admission policies.

The United States ranks 24th out of 29 surveyed countries in the reading and science literacy as well as mathematical abilities of its high school students when compared with other developed nations. The United States also has a low literacy rate compared to other developed countries, with a reading literacy rate at 86 - 98% of the population over age 15. As for educational attainment, 27.2% of the population aged 25 and above have earned a bachelor's degree or higher, and 84.6% have graduated high school.

Health

The World Health Organization ranks the United States' health level 72nd among the world's nations. Infant mortality is 5 per 1,000; among developed nations, only Latvia ranks lower, at 6 per 1,000. However, this statistic is contested by some experts, because other nations may not define infant mortality as broadly as the United States. Obesity is also a public-health problem, which is estimated to cost tens of billions of dollars every year.

Unlike many Western governments, the U.S. government does not operate a publicly funded health care system. Private insurance plays a major role in covering health care costs. Health insurance in the United States is traditionally a benefit of employment. However, emergency care facilities are required to provide service regardless of the patient's ability to pay. Medical bills are the most common reason for personal bankruptcy in the United States. The nation spends a substantial amount on medical research through such federal agencies as the National Institutes of Health.

Culture

The culture of the United States began as the culture of its first English colonists. The culture quickly evolved as an independent frontier culture supplemented by indigenous and Spanish–Mexican cowboy culture and by the cultures of subsequent waves of immigrants, first from Europe and Africa and later from Asia. Overall, significant cultural influences came from Europe, especially from the German, English and Irish cultures and later from Italian, Greek and Ashkenazi cultures. Descendants of enslaved West Africans preserved some cultural traditions from West Africa in the early United States. Geographical place names largely reflect the combined English, Dutch, French, Spanish, and Native American components of U.S. American history.

Some have described the United States as a melting pot in which immigrants eventually assimilate into a unified American culture that incorporates contributions from immigrant cultures. A more recently proposed model is that of the salad bowl, in which immigrant cultures retain some of the unique characteristics of their culture without merging into a completely unified American culture. Modern American sociologists tend to view pluralism, rather than assimilation, as the way for American society to achieve ethnic and racial harmony and state that the workings of pluralism are visible within modern American society, disregarding the idea of the melting pot.

An important component of American culture is the American Dream: the idea that, through hard work, courage, and self-determination, regardless of social class, a person can gain a better life.

Cuisine

American cuisine embraces Native American ingredients such as turkey, potatoes, corn, and squash, which have become integral parts of American culture. Such popular icons as apple pie, pizza, and hamburgers are either derived from or are actual European dishes. Burritos and tacos have their origins in Mexico. Soul food, which originated among African slaves, is popular in the U.S. as well. However, many foods now enjoyed worldwide either originated in the United States or were altered by American chefs.

Music

Music also traces to the country's diverse cultural roots through an array of styles. Rock, hip hop, country, blues, and jazz are among the country's most internationally renowned genres. Since the late 19th century, popular recorded music from the United States has become increasingly known across the world, such that some forms of American popular music are heard almost everywhere.

Cinema

The birth of cinema, as well as its development, largely took place in the United States. In 1878, the first recorded instance of sequential photographs capturing and reproducing motion was Eadweard Muybridge's series of a running horse, which the British-born photographer produced in Palo Alto, California, using a row of still cameras. Since then, the American film industry, based in Hollywood, California, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world. Other genres that originated in the United States and spread worldwide include the comic book and Disney's animated films.

Sports

Sports are a national pastime, and playing sports, especially American football, baseball, and basketball, is very popular at the high-school level. Professional sports in the U.S. is big business and contains most of the world's highest paid athletes. The "Big Four" sports are baseball, American football, ice hockey, and basketball. Baseball is popularly termed "the national pastime"; but, since the early 1990s, American football has largely been considered the most popular sport in America.

Other sports, including auto racing, lacrosse, soccer, golf, and tennis, have significant followings. The United States is among the most influential regions in shaping three popular board-based recreational sports: surfboarding, skateboarding, and snowboarding. Eight Olympiads have taken place in the United States; in medals won, the United States ranks third all-time in the Winter Games, with 218 (78 gold, 81 silver, and 59 bronze), and first in the Summer Games, with 2,321 (943 gold, 736 silver, and 642 bronze).

See also

• Articles of Confederation
• United States Constitution
• History of the United States
• International rankings of the United States
• Historical Columbia
• Superpower

Notes

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Further reading

• Johnson, Paul M. A History of the American People. 1104 pages. Harper Perennial: March 1, 1999. ISBN 0-06-093034-9.
• Litwak, Robert S. Rogue States and U.S. Foreign Policy : Containment after the Cold War. 300 pages. Woodrow Wilson Center Press: February 1, 2000. ISBN 0-943875-97-8.
• Nye, Joseph S. The Paradox of American Power : Why the World's Only Superpower Can't Go It Alone. 240 pages. Oxford University Press, USA; New Ed edition: 1 May 2003. ISBN 0-19-516110-6.
• Susser, Ida (Editor), and Patterson, Thomas C. (Editor). Cultural Diversity in the United States: A Critical Reader. 476 pages. Blackwell Publishers: December 2000. ISBN 0-631-22213-8.
• Whalen, Edward. The United States Of Europe: The New Superpower and the End of American Supremacy. 320 pages. The Penguin Press HC: 4 November 2004. ISBN 1-59420-033-5.
• Pierson, Paul. Politics in Time : History, Institutions, and Social Analysis. 208 pages. Princeton University Press: 9 August 2004. ISBN 0-691-11715-2.

External links

Government

• Official U.S. government Web portal - Gateway to governmental sites
• White House - Official site of the President of the United States
• Senate - Official site of the United States Senate
• House - Official site of the United States House of Representatives
• Supreme Court - Official site of the Supreme Court of the United States
• U.S. Federal Government

Overviews

• U.S. Census Housing and Economic Statistics Updated regularly by U.S. Bureau of the Census.
• Portrait of the United States - Published by the United States Information Agency, September 1997.
• CIA World Factbook Entry for United States
• Encyclopaedia Britannica, United States - Country Page
• Info links for each state
• Population, employment, income, and farm characteristics by State
• Tours to USA
• U-S-A

History

• Historical Documents
• National Motto: History and Constitutionality
• Historicalstatistics.org - Links to historical statistics of USA

Maps

• WikiSatellite view of United States at WikiMapia
• The National Atlas of the United States.
• United States map

Immigration

• U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services USCIS.gov.
• U.S. citizenship sample civics questions for naturalization interview Immihelp.com - from an immigrant to future immigrants.
• Civic Orientation - Sample Questions for Naturalization

Other

• Voter turnout, Gender quotas, Electoral system design and Political party financing in United States

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