Geographic
. Main articles: Geography of the United States, Climate of the United States, and Environment of the United States
“The land area of the contiguous United States is approximately 1,900 million acres (7,700,000 km2). Alaska, separated from the contiguous United States by Canada, is the largest state at 365 million acres (1,480,000 km2). Hawaii, occupying an archipelago in the central Pacific, southwest of North America, has just over 4 million acres (16,000 km2).[1] The United States is the world's third or fourth largest nation by total area (land and water), ranking behind Russia and Canada and just above or below China. The ranking varies depending on how two territories disputed by China and India are counted and how the total size of the United States is measured: calculations range from 3,676,486 square miles (9,522,055 km2)[2] to 3,717,813 square miles (9,629,091 km2)[3] to 3,794,101 square miles (9,826,676 km2).Including only land area, the United States is third in size behind Russia and China, just ahead of Canada.[4]”
Government
Main articles: Federal government of the United States, state governments of the United States, and elections in the United States
The west front of the United States Capitol, which houses the United States CongressThe United States is the world's oldest surviving federation. It is a constitutional republic and representative democracy, "in which majority rule is tempered by minority rights protected by law".[5] The government is regulated by a system of checks and balances defined by the U.S. Constitution, which serves as the country's supreme legal document.[6] In the American federalist system, citizens are usually subject to three levels of government, federal, state, and local; the local government's duties are commonly split between county and municipal governments. In almost all cases, executive and legislative officials are elected by a plurality vote of citizens by district. There is no proportional representation at the federal level, and it is very rare at lower levels.
Transportation
Personal transportation is dominated by automobiles, which operate on a network of 13 million roads,[7] including one of the world's longest highway systems.[8] The world's second largest automobile market,[9] the United States has the highest rate of per-capita vehicle ownership in the world, with 765 vehicles per 1,000 Americans.[10] About 40% of personal vehicles are vans, SUVs, or light trucks.[11] The average American adult (accounting for all drivers and nondrivers) spends 55 minutes driving every day, traveling 29 miles (47 km).[12]
Education
Main article: Education in the United States
See also: Educational attainment in the United States and Higher education in the United States
American public education is operated by state and local governments, regulated by the United States Department of Education through restrictions on federal grants. Children are required in most states to attend school from the age of six or seven (generally, kindergarten or first grade) until they turn eighteen (generally bringing them through twelfth grade, the end of high school); some states allow students to leave school at sixteen or seventeen.[13] About 12% of children are enrolled in parochial or nonsectarian private schools. Just over 2% of children are homeschooled.[14]
The United States has many competitive private and public institutions of higher education. According to prominent international rankings, 13 or 15 American colleges and universities are ranked among the top 20 in the world.[15][16] There are also local community colleges with generally more open admission policies, shorter academic programs, and lower tuition. Of Americans twenty-five and older, 84.6% graduated from high school, 52.6% attended some college, 27.2% earned a bachelor's degree, and 9.6% earned graduate degrees.[17] The basic literacy rate is approximately 99%.[18] The United Nations assigns the United States an Education Index of 0.97, tying it for 12th in the world.[155]
Culture
“The United States is a multicultural nation, home to a wide variety of ethnic groups, traditions, and values.Aside from the now small Native American and Native Hawaiian populations, nearly all Americans or their ancestors immigrated within the past five centuries.Mainstream American culture is a Western culture largely derived from the traditions of European immigrants with influences from many other sources, such as traditions brought by slaves from Africa.More recent immigration from Asia and especially Latin America has added to a cultural mix that has been described as both a homogenizing melting pot, and a heterogeneous salad bowl in which immigrants and their descendants retain distinctive cultural characteristics.
American culture is considered the most individualistic in the world.Though the American Dream, or the perception that Americans enjoy high social mobility, plays a key role in attracting immigrants, other developed nations offer greater social mobility. While the mainstream culture holds that the United States is a classless society..scholars identify significant differences between the country's social classes, affecting socialization, language, and values.The American middle and professional class has initiated many contemporary social trends such as modern feminism, environmentalism, and multiculturalism.Americans' self-images, social viewpoints, and cultural expectations are associated with their occupations to an unusually close degree. While Americans tend greatly to value socioeconomic achievement, being ordinary or average is generally seen as a positive attribute.”
Food
“Mainstream American cuisine is similar to that in other Western countries. Wheat is the primary cereal grain. Traditional American cuisine uses indigenous ingredients, such as turkey, venison, potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, squash, and maple syrup, which were consumed by Native Americans and early European settlers. Slow-cooked pork and beef barbecue, crab cakes, potato chips, and chocolate chip cookies are distinctively American foods. Soul food, developed by African slaves, is popular around the South and among many African Americans elsewhere. Syncretic cuisines such as Louisiana creole, Cajun, and Tex-Mex are regionally important.
Characteristic dishes such as apple pie, fried chicken, pizza, hamburgers, and hot dogs derive from the recipes of various immigrants. French fries, Mexican dishes such as burritos and tacos, and pasta dishes freely adapted from Italian sources are widely consumed.Americans generally prefer coffee to tea. Marketing by U.S. industries is largely responsible for making orange juice and milk ubiquitous breakfast beverages.
The American fast food industry, the world's largest, pioneered the drive-through format in the 1930s. Fast food consumption has sparked health concerns. During the 1980s and 1990s, Americans' caloric intake rose 24%.frequent dining at fast food outlets is associated with what public health officials call the American "obesity epidemic".Highly sweetened soft drinks are widely popular, and sugared beverages account for 9% of American caloric intake.”
Sports
“Baseball has been regarded as the national sport since the late 19th century, while American football is now by several measures the most popular spectator sport.Basketball and ice hockey are the country's next two leading professional team sports. College football and basketball attract large audiences. Boxing and horse racing were once the most watched individual sports,but they have been eclipsed by golf and auto racing, particularly NASCAR. Soccer is played widely at the youth and amateur levels. Tennis and many outdoor sports are popular as well.
While most major U.S. sports have evolved out of European practices, volleyball, skateboarding, snowboarding, and cheerleading are American inventions. Basketball was invented in Massachusetts by Canadian-born James Naismith. Lacrosse and surfing arose from Native American and Native Hawaiian activities that predate Western contact. Eight Olympic Games have taken place in the United State. The United States has won 2,301 medals at the Summer Olympic Games, more than any other country, and 253 in the Winter Olympic Games, the second most.”
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/us.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_State
1. Lubowski, Ruben, Marlow Vesterby, and Shawn Bucholtz (2006-07-21). "AREI Chapter 1.1: Land Use". Economic Research Service. http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/arei/eib16/chapter1/1.1/. Retrieved 2009-03-09.
2. "United States". Encyclopædia Britannica. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/616563/United-States. Retrieved 2008-03-25 (area given in square miles).
3."Population by Sex, Rate of Population Increase, Surface Area and Density". Demographic Yearbook 2005. UN Statistics Division. http://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic/products/dyb/DYB2005/Table03.pdf. Retrieved 2008-03-25 (area given in square kilometers).
5.Scheb, John M., and John M. Scheb II (2002). An Introduction to the American Legal System. Florence, KY: Delmar, p. 6. ISBN 0-7668-2759-3.
6. Killian, Johnny H.. "Constitution of the United States". The Office of the Secretary of the Senate. The Office of the Secretary of the Senate. http://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm. Retrieved February 11, 2012.
7"Number of Highways". WikiSPEEDia, derived from U.S. Census Bureau. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikispeedia. Retrieved 2010-06-10.
8. Newgeography.com (2011-01-22). "China Expressway System to Exceed US Interstates". Newgeography.com. http://www.newgeography.com/content/002003-china-expressway-system-exceed-us-interstates. Retrieved 2011-09-16.
9. Agencies (2010-01-08). "China overtakes US in car sales | Business | guardian.co.uk". London: Guardian. http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/jan/08/china-us-car-sales-overtakes. Retrieved 2011-07-10.
10. "Motor vehicles statistics – countries compared worldwide". NationMaster. http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/tra_mot_veh-transportation-motor-vehicles. Retrieved 2011-07-10.
11. "Household, Individual, and Vehicle Characteristics". 2001 National Household Travel Survey. U.S. Dept. of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics. http://www.bts.gov/publications/highlights_of_the_2001_national_household_travel_survey/html/section_01.html. Retrieved 2007-08-15.
12 "Daily Passenger Travel". 2001 National Household Travel Survey. U.S. Dept. of Transportation, Bureau of Transportation Statistics. http://www.bts.gov/publications/highlights_of_the_2001_national_household_travel_survey/html/section_02.html. Retrieved 2007-08-15.
