How to get the placeholder text to appear in the <blank> option in a Dropdown?

[robert]

I have a dropdown with placeholder text “All Countries”. The dropdown lists all of the countries below the first option, which is blank, and therefore is needlessly confusing.

And worse yet, if you select the blank option, the dropdown displays blank (not the placeholder text).

Ideally, the dropdown should display the placeholder text, and show this placeholder text if selected.

Not as good, but an improvement, would be for the placeholder text to at least display again if the blank selection is chosen.

Does anyone have a solution?

[mebeingken]

Just want to make sure you know you can remove the blank from the list by checking this box on the element:

[robert]

I want empty to be a possibility, so all countries.