That
is a privilege that Americans got a little too used to, and which
they now have to adapt to having lost. No longer is the country the
young and vibrant place that it once was. Many other countries have
more or less caught up with the individual wealth of Americans in
terms of living conditions, and some have even moved past it.
Australians have larger homes on average, and they have adequate
healthcare for their people, as well as a month and a half worth of
vacation time. It is seen as a sunny paradise and place that is
filled with natural wonders and immense beauty, to boot, and is an
enviable model for the rest of the world.
Australia's
not quite neighbors, New Zealand, have also produced a decent
standard of living for themselves. Yes, famously, this is a tiny
country, and there are more sheep than people here. It is also a
country that has been very blessed with tremendous natural beauty,
attracting such epic movie franchises like Star Wars and Lord of the
Rings to film in their country for some amazing scenes in natural
beauty that nowhere else in the world can perhaps compare to. It was
the first country with a mixed economy to try what Americans often
derisively label “socialized medicine”, and they have many
government programs, like all other industrialized nations, that
provide their citizens with significant benefits that assist them in
their living conditions.
Canada
does not have the sunny paradise image, but there is plenty of
natural beauty that the country has in abundance, and the living
standards are on average higher in recent years than they have been
for their southern neighbors. Canadians have wealth, even tremendous
wealth, in places, much like exists in the United States. But they do
not have such extreme polarities between rich and poor. They do not
have slums and broken down inner cities like their American
counterparts. Canadian cities tend to be much cleaner and safer, and
reflect a rich mosaic of cultural diversity. They also have adequate
healthcare for all, despite imperfections in their system.
Scandinavian
countries have reached the very highest standards of living in the
world, and remained there perennially now for many years. These are
countries that have, like Canada, also been blessed with incredible
wild beauty and open spaces and, also like Canada, have surpassed
Americans in terms of living standards. They also have a good
healthcare system that covers everyone, and enjoy much more vacation
time than Americans. There are government assistance programs that
would surely shock and appall Americans, and the system of justice
and prisons is a radical departure in their approach than what we
Americans have seen.
These
are smaller countries, but there might be a point about that which
needs to be made: these Scandinavian countries, as well as Canada and
Australia, do not have the same weight of high expectations and the
burden of carrying the weight of their history like Americans do, and
this has been freeing to them, I think. They have been willing and
able to learn from the examples of other countries, and to benefit
from this. They have been cast in the shadows often times. Australia
is half a world away from almost everybody else in the world, of
course. Canada is overshadowed by their much larger, more powerful,
and more famous neighbor, to the point that former Prime Minister
Trudeau compared it to sleeping next to an elephant, where every
little noise made by the larger neighbor grabs your attention, by
necessity. Similarly, the Scandinavian countries are smaller, and
often the forgotten part of Europe, in the shadow of the larger –
and warmer – countries to the south. Yet, each of these nations
have learned to make do on their own, and quietly have raised their
living standards to such an extent that they have become the envy of
other nations – including those much larger nations. Maybe it helps
that they do not carry the same arrogance of the larger nations, who
have histories and traditions that they feel attached to, and feel
the need to continue along. Even when it perhaps does not serve in
their best interests anymore.
Other
countries have certain advantages over the United States as well, and
much of it has to do with the dreaded government assistance programs
that Americans have such an irrational phobia about. I already
mentioned that Australia has six weeks vacation, but so do Germans.
France has five weeks vacation, and the French also enjoy affordable
childcare, as well as a healthcare system that goes far towards
meeting the needs of it's citizens in a timely and affordable manner.
Great Britain also has an affordable healthcare system for it's
citizens, with strong price control measures that keep medicine and
treatment at affordable rates for it's citizens. In fact, healthcare
is pretty universally viewed as a right, not a privilege for those
who can afford it, in almost every industrialized country – with
one notable exception. That would be right here in the United States.
I wrote a rather impassioned blog entry about that very topic called
“The Criminalization of Affordable Healthcare in America” (April
6, 2012), because providing your citizens affordable healthcare has
long been viewed by me as the truest measuring stick of how generous
a country you are. Say what you want to disagree with me if you will,
but the fact that the United States has simply failed to provide that
for it's citizens, I think, speaks volumes about the way it treats
those who are less fortunate. For a country that is often viewed as
very religious, this contradiction is hard for me to swallow, and I
say that as an American.
But
it is not just restricted to healthcare. In other countries, they
have higher minimum wages, more vacation time, more affordable
options for childcare and education assistance, not to mention a
higher quality of education. This is because these are higher
priorities in those nations, and they recognize the necessity of
providing that for their citizens. Governments are seen, rightly, as
representatives of the people, and they do a bit more than we do here
to provide assistance for their people. Even in private enterprise,
their seems to be a focus on friendlier accessibility to things for
the common folk, such as good public transportation, like they have
in Europe and Japan. They protect their citizens against pollution
and environmental degradation far more than Americans tend to,
because they do not equate government prevention of corporate
irresponsibility and reckless plundering of resources as somehow
limiting “freedom”. What kind of “freedom” is that, in any
case? How much “freedom” did the people of Love Canal or Rocky
Flats, or Times Beach have? Famously, in Hinkley, California,the
residents there were powerless to fight the criminal actions of a
powerful local company before Erin Brockovich met with her incredible
success in forcing corporate PSE&G to stop hiding behind their
well-funded legal team and to take ownership of their irresponsible
actions and provide some compensation for those affected. That was
made into a feel good movie, of course, which really just illustrates
how rare a triumph that was. In fact, things like that seem to be
happening all of the time, yet rarely does it end on such a bright
and positive note, with Julia Roberts in the starring role. I used to
work for a few days at a site that was affected like that. It was
Pepe Field in Boonton, and Drew Chemicals had generously provided
this slot of land for the township, being praised for their
generosity, until it was discovered that they had been illegally
dumping chemicals there. Suddenly, there were concerns about health
and cancer rates, and there were houses on stilts, much like you
might see at a beach. Yet, even that seemed to have a happy ending,
thanks largely to the EPA's Superfund activity there. But when
Americans tak about blaoted government and wasteful spending, many
would not hesitate to view these things as perfect examples. That is
a dangerous road we are traveling, if we continue down that path.
I
am not saying that government is the cure all, by any stretch of the
imagination. In fact, I think I tend to be more skeptical of
government than most, and feel that they are public servants, and are
owed nothing. There should be strong and sharp public scrutiny of all
government officials and agencies, and they should be held
accountable for their actions in ways that they simply are not right
at the moment. That is another discussion.
But
governments are the common person's best tool to keep other strong
institutions in heck, in a de facto system of checks and balances
that allow people to live their own lives. Reagan famously cited
government as being the problem, and it sounds great in speeches, and
he is often quoted to the present day. However, he seemed a lot less
critical of private and corporate irresponsibility, and in this day
and age, we cannot afford to focus on the image and ideal words that
Reagan represented, when the reality is that those very policies of
weakening government that Reagan initiated have directly led to a
lower standard of living for the American people. Much like with
McCarthyism and Cold War extremity, we have to get over our phobias
and look at the whole picture, or we will figuratively and,
increasingly, literally be impoverished for our own blindness and
arrogance. In fact, we already have been.
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