A summary, from Modern Survival Blog:

The nation once had a much more self-sufficient lifestyle. Local farmers produced the fruits, vegetables, dairy, and meats that were consumed. Its citizens would often grow some or much of their own food in their own gardens. Some produced even more, and would sell or trade within the local community. They knew there neighbors and many others in town. The local community was able to provide the essentials, and often more than that. There was a higher sense of pride within the community.

Nations would produce,  build, and manufacture products and goods from the sweat of their own citizen labor. As transportation systems developed, the goods were transported and sold further into the regions of the nation. The system and process of manufacture through consumption, was a loop that was often contained within the nation itself. The nation grew and developed a wide ranging skill set and strengths. They built things.

The corporations grew within the nation. Some grew very large, large enough to buy politicians, who in turn passed favorable laws enabling the manufacture of goods in other lesser developed nations with cheaper labor. These products were imported back into the nation to be sold with higher profits. For a while, this seemed to work well for the nation while their citizens were able to buy cheaper products than they could produce themselves.

The largest corporations became global entities, with little regard for the nations themselves, other than to purchase political power to use when needed.

Then one day, the nation awoke and realized that it hardly produced and manufactured anything anymore. It only consumed and serviced. The nation was now subservient to other nations, although most of its citizenry did not realize it.

The nations financial markets collapsed after having squeezed out all of the nations goodness and knowing there was no more to be had. The nation was once the largest manufacturing nation on Earth. It had become the largest consuming nation on Earth. Globalism had enabled the nations financial markets to scoop up huge sums of money.

In an effort to maintain a semblance of financial stability, the nations government borrowed massive sums of its own currency to flood into its markets, thinking that its government could create sustainable productivity. Each month, more and more was borrowed in a desperate attempt to avoid a final collapse.

The collapse came. The nation was bankrupt. Everyone saw that the Emperor wore no clothes.