Official Name: The United States of America.

Background

The United States gained its independence from Britain in 1776. Today, the United States is a federal republic consisting of 50 states. Additionally, the United States has close associations with the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam and the US Virgin Islands and exercises trusteeship on behalf of the United Nations over several Pacific Island groups. George W. Bush has been the 43rd President of the United States since 2001.

Geography

The United States is a country, which covers a large part of North America. The United States is located north of Mexico and south of Canada. The country also shares its borders with the Atlantic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean. The U.S. is the world's third-largest country by size (after Russia and China) and by population (after China and India).

Two of the 50 states are not joined to the mainland of the U.S. The State of Alaska is located in the northwest corner of the continent and is separated from the U.S. mainland by Canada. The State of Hawaii is an island and is located in the central Pacific Ocean.

The U.S. has an enormous diversity of geographical features, from the vast central plains to the rugged mountains in west. With the diversity of geography comes the variance in climate. The climate is mostly temperate, but tropical in Hawaii and Florida, arctic in Alaska, semiarid in the great plains west of the Mississippi River, and arid in the Great Basin of the southwest.

The United States’ natural resources include coal, copper, lead, molybdenum, phosphates, uranium, bauxite, gold, iron, mercury, nickel, potash, silver, tungsten, zinc, petroleum, natural gas, and timber.

People

The United States’ population is approximately 278,059,000. Washington, D.C., the nation’s capital, has a population of approximately 570,000. New York City is the largest city in the U.S. with a population of over 8,000,000. Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, Philadelphia, Phoenix, San Diego, Dallas and San Antonio have populations of over one million.

The United States’ population consists of many races and ethnic origins. Approximately 75% of the U.S. population is white, 12% is black or African-American, 4% is Asian, and 1% is American Indian or Alaska Native. 12.5% of the U.S. population is of Hispanic origin. (Note: The U.S. federal government considers race and Hispanic origin to be two separate and distinct concepts.)

Approximately 56% of the U.S. population is Protestant, 28% is Roman Catholic, 2% is Jewish, 4% are other religions, and 10% have no religion.

English is the language spoken by Americans with Spanish being the second most commonly spoken language amongst the minorities.

Government

The United State’s government has been a federal republic since 1789. The U.S. Constitution ensures that the executive, legislative, judiciary, and presidential powers as well as the individual states are balanced by constitutional procedures. The president is elected by an Electoral College system based on universal adult suffrage every four years. No president may be elected to serve more than two consecutive full terms of office.

Congress, the legislative branch of the government, is bicameral. The Senate has two members from each state, whereas the House of Representatives allocates seats on the basis of population. Each state has its own governor and enjoys a fairly high degree of self-government.

2002 United States Federal Government Holidays

2003 United States Federal Government Holidays

United States Currency

The United States Currency is the dollar. The United States has paper currency in the following denominations: one dollar, five dollars, ten dollars, twenty dollars, fifty dollars, and one hundred dollars. The United States coins are the penny (1¢), the nickel (5¢), the dime (10¢), the quarter (25¢), the half dollar (50¢), and the dollar ($1.00). One dollar is equivalent to 100¢. The rate of exchange between the United States dollar and the Jordanian dinar is 1 US $ = 0.704 JD.

Time:

The United States has several time zones. Daylight savings times in the United States starts on the first Sunday in April and ends on the last Sunday in October.

There are some parts of the United States and its territories which do not observe daylight savings: Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, most of the Eastern Time Zone portion of the State of Indiana, and the state of Arizona, excluding the Navajo Indian Reservation. The Navajo Nation participates in the Daylight Saving Time policy, due to its large size and location in three states.

Business Hours

Government offices and most banks and businesses are closed on Saturdays and Sundays. Government offices are open from 08:30 to 17:00 Monday through Friday.

Source: The CIA’s World Fact Book, 2001.
            The U.S. Census Bureau, 2000.