Over the past four years, prosperity has increased around the globe, while it has remained stagnant in the United States

As a result, the London-based Think Tank Legatum Institute ranked the United States 12th out of 142 countries on its 2012 Prosperity Index, putting the country outside the top ten for the first time. Returning us to prosperity requires an understanding of the causes behind our stagnant well-being. The Legatum Institute finds that a decline in entrepreneurship and economic opportunity, rather than slippage in education, health, safety or personal freedom, is to blame. In particular, the authors say that the fall in prosperity is driven by a decline in the number of US citizens who believe that hard work will get them ahead.