Ordinarily, the heart of a problem can be reduced to several sentences, some times one sentence or even one word. This is never done because the short answer would be the truth. The world operates according to laws of dominance and subservience. Each of the world’s seven billion plus human inhabitants is guided by self interest. Vast fortunes are made by working through government to extract the time and resources of the population. Truth stands as a barrier to getting what one wants. If the truth ever sounds good, a lie can make it sound even better. The path of least resistance is to replace the truth with a small lie initially and and increase the size of the lie over time.
An interesting aspect of the truth is that when it is actually spoken no one hears it. No one remembers reading it. The truth is dismissed.
Regardless here it is in one sentence. The world is moving into a severe economic depression because of lack of faith in free markets. This includes Americans who try and promote free markets.
The book of Hebrews gives a good definition of faith. The definition is true whether or not the reader is an atheist, believer or member of a religion that doesn’t use the New Testament.
“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” Hebrews_11:1
The U.S. Economy was intended to be largely free market driven. Smart people know that they will come out ahead personally if they can rig their own markets and have all others bound by the principles of supply and demand. When there is a routine downturn in the business cycle leaders and rank and file alike panic and look to the government to “make the economy recover.” Opportunists seize the occasion to to extract money out of the population in the name of stimulation. Resources become very inefficiently allocated over time and the result is a major economic disaster.
Hebrews is dealing with faith in God but the definition applies to truth in general.
Americans have rejected the one thing that can save the country and that is a free market system. So here it is, the cause of all the country’s economic problems, no faith in free markets.