What is the economic system of the United States?

Which answers are accepted?

What does the answer mean?

An economic system is the way a country makes goods, sells them and shares the money. In a capitalist system, people and companies can own property, start businesses and compete for customers. Buyers choose what to buy, and the market, not a central plan, shapes most prices.

Free market economy is the same idea in plain words, and the lists accept both names. The government still makes rules, such as safety laws, but private owners run most businesses. Learn whichever name you find easier to say.

Why does USCIS ask it?

This question sits in the principles of government part of the list, close to the rule of law question. It checks that you know how the country organizes its work and money, not only how it organizes its government.

Both lists mark it with an asterisk, one of the 20 questions chosen for the 65/20 special consideration, so it is worth knowing well.

How the officer asks it

The officer asks one question and listens for a short answer, so say capitalism or free market economy. Two answers are listed on each list. Pick one, say it out loud until it feels natural, and then choose the matching answer in the check on this page.

What are the common wrong answers?

Other systems have names that sound alike, but they are not the answer.

• Communism. In that system the government owns and plans most of the economy, close to the opposite of a free market.
• Feudalism. That was a medieval arrangement based on land and loyalty to a lord, not a modern market.
• Barter. Trading goods without money is a way of trading, not the name of a country's system.

How can I remember it?

Capital is money put into a business to make more, and capitalism takes its name from it. Free market means buyers and sellers are free to choose. Keep whichever name sounds natural in your own voice.

Which questions are related?

• What is the rule of law?The idea that laws bind leaders and the government as much as everyone else.
• What is the supreme law of the land?The one document that outranks every federal, state and local law.
• What does the President’s Cabinet do?The Cabinet is the group of senior advisers to the President, mostly the leaders of the executive departments.
• When was the Declaration of Independence adopted?July 4, 1776: the day Congress adopted the Declaration, which is the day Americans celebrate as Independence Day.

See all civics questions