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US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

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Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#101

Post by soperj »

rayiner wrote: post #55
soperj wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you still have plenty of homesless and destitute. Pretty sad that you can't look after the most vunerable.

Homelessness rates in the US are lower than many big European countries: https://www.oecd.org/els/family/HC3-1-Homeless-population.pd... Lower than France, Germany, and the UK, Sweden, Canada, and Australia. Equal to the Netherlands.

I live in Canada, and have been to many US states. This doesn't reflect what I've seen in the least. Even if it is true, it still doesn't change the fact that if the poorest 20% is richer than Europe's middle class that you have more than enough resources to do something about it.

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#102

Post by rayiner »

ineedasername wrote: post #90
tdhoot wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lowest income people in the US also qualify for free healthcare through Medicaid. It covers ~20% of the US population (that number also includes those with disabilities).

Medicaid isn't bad, it's better than many bottom-tier private plans, but it's also got some problems. For one, finding a doctor can be hard. Not so much with general practitioners, but definitely with specialists. Also if you're in the higher qualified income band, you can still get stuck with 10 to 20% of the bill, and making 150% of the poverty limit doesn't make you any better equipped to deal with $100,000 in exp…

That’s what the ACA is for! For people up to 400% of the poverty line, the ACA caps premiums at 10% of income. That’s what you’d pay in health insurance taxes in France.

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#104

Post by pvaldes »

rayiner wrote: post #91
Reason077 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "But if consumption capacity was equal in Europe, that consumption would shift to something else, such as food and entertainment." Yes. But my point is that not all consumption can be considered equal in terms of the wellbeing and quality of life that it provides. For example, if I was spending $5000 per year on car payments and fuel for my commute to work, that's a lot of 'consumption'. But it isn't something that…

Americans could live in a city where they walk, cycle, or ride a tram to work. For the most part, they don’t want to. They used to have such cities, but they ripped up the tram lines and put in freeways. (Part of that is because most of the US is quite unpleasant to walk or cycle in from a weather point of view. The average high in Amsterdam, a famous cycling city, tops out at 72 degrees. In Atlanta, it’s 80+ from Ma…

Napoleon had the same problem with his soldiers, and solved it with lots of sycamores. Atlanta could put some temporary structures to give shadow also.

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#105

Post by racino84 »

titanomachy wrote: post #99

If I have a billion dollars, and start a country that consists of me in my palace and 2000 other people living in abject poverty, we are now the "richest nation on earth" by this definition. Big whoop.

Except your country would be very poor, because you'd have either another country's currency, or you would have a $1bn trade deficit and little actual wealth - thats after you somehow get yourself some UN recognized sovereign territory

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#106

Post by cadlin »

rayiner wrote: post #82
Cyph0n wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you get from "slower internet" to "there is a pattern"? If you scroll two comments up, you'll see the most crucial difference: free healthcare. Healthcare-related expenses can bankrupt an entire family in the US, even with great health insurance... Then there is free education, but let's leave that aside for now.

That’s also consistent with the pattern. 75% of Americans have either employer paid insurance or Medicare. For those people, premiums and out of pocket costs are on average less than the extra taxes they’d pay in Europe for health insurance: https://www.assembly.ca.gov/sites/assembly.ca.gov/files/Arch... (page 18, showing 5.2% of household income spent on premiums and out of pocket costs). (Note that France doesn’t h…

France pays less for healthcare than the US and gets more. A lot more.

To pick a statistic, their maternal mortality rate is 1/3 of the US.

Because the US is a wealthier country overall it can waste more money and receive worse results. That isn't an argument in favor the US healthcare system.

Also, do you realize that the graph you are citing isn't tracking the cost of US healthcare to a US citizen, it is literally saying Americans spend 5% of their personal income on health insurance. It is not counting the taxes they already pay, the cost to their employers, etc.

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#107

Post by mandelbrotwurst »

negrit wrote: post #89
gnopgnip wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly a quarter of US residents are on medicaid, and have free healthcare. Medical bankruptcy was a big problem, but under the ACA the yearly out of pocket max has all but eliminated these.

there is no such thing as free healthcare, someone has to pay for it...

Do you think it is likely that the person you're replying to doesn't know this or are they simply calling attention to the fact that Medicaid recipients receive care that they themselves do not pay for?

Is the statement in some way unclear? Care to suggest a rephrasing?

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#108

Post by emmelaich »

lacampbell wrote: post #66
rayiner wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Homelessness rates in the US are lower than many big European countries: https://www.oecd.org/els/family/HC3-1-Homeless-population.pd... Lower than France, Germany, and the UK, Sweden, Canada, and Australia. Equal to the Netherlands.

Interesting fact, but not sure what Canada or Australia are doing in that list. Maybe they're in Eurovision?

Correct.

They're semantically European but syntactically not. :-)

i.e. in the OECD countries..

http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/oecd-countries/

Re: US takes 'richest nation on earth' crown from Switzerland

#110

Post by sanxiyn »

m0zg wrote: post #49
irrational wrote: post #5

TIL Switzerland is the richest nation on earth. If I was going to guess, I probably would've guessed Saudi Arabia or Luxembourg.

Visit Zurich. Prices are ~2x what they are in my (fairly pricy already) area in the US. That's the direct consequence of high median income: businesses charge what the market will bear.

Note that the article is about wealth, not income.
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