Since America never was a Democracy so I’m not sure what is being discussed in the Economy although I do agree there has been a major deduction in personal freedom in the US. A Democracy is is a system for the voters vote on everything themselves which can’t work for large populations. The United States was set up as a representative republic and the reductions in freedom and economics has directly followed the increase in the size of the federal government. I would not be surprised if the best measure of freedom would be the size of government verses the number of citizens. or possibly the number of laws passed each year.