answer:Those Americans that benefit from being bilingual—largely, the ones that grew up in families and communities where a language besides English is the dominant one—are bilingual, by and large. Why should someone who has no interest in travelling more than 50 miles from home and who uses only English in his day to day interactions invest years of effort into becoming fluent in a second language? What good does it do him? (For the record, I speak two languages, can get by in one more, and read and write a dead language, so I’m doing my best to bring up the average.)