At its pinnacle in 2000, the United States ranked second in the world for economic freedom. In the latest report on world economic freedom from the Fraser Institute, the U.S. has now dropped all the way down to 18th, falling behind countries like Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Estonia, Taiwan and Qatar.

The decline did not happen overnight. “This entire decade we’ve been sliding towards this 18th ranking,” report author Joshua Hall explained to The Daily Caller News Foundation.

By 2005, the United States had already dropped to eighth in economic freedom. In 2009, the U.S. fell behind welfare state countries like Denmark, Finland and Canada.

“When people think of Canada, they think of socialized medicine, but in many facets of life, Canada is a lot more economically free than the United States,” said Hall.

The annual report uses 42 different variables that can be categorized into five distinct categories: size of government, legal system and property rights, sound money, freedom of trade internationally and regulation.

Orders placed with U.S. factories fell in August by the most in more than three years, signaling that slowdowns in business investment and exports restrained the economic expansion.

The 5.2 percent decrease in bookings was the biggest since January 2009 and followed a revised 2.6 percent increase in July, the Commerce Department said today in Washington. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg News survey called for a decline of 5.9 percent. Demand for durable goods dropped 13.2 percent, the same as reported last week, while shipments of non-durables, which includes such things as petroleum and chemicals and often reflect swings in price, climbed 2.2 percent.

New York (CNNMoney) - The federal government logged a $1.1 trillion deficit in fiscal year 2012 – marking the fourth straight year of trillion-dollar shortfalls.

As a share of the economy, the deficit fell to roughly 7%, according to Congressional Budget Office estimates released Friday. That’s down from 8.7% in 2011, and well below the bruising 10.1% recorded in 2009 during the depth of the economic downturn.

Deficits as a share of GDP in the past four years have been the highest since 1947.

Patriotic Americans know that we have a responsibility to take care of the veterans who served their country.

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