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We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

nytimes.com

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Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#81

Post by pbhjpbhj »

davidw wrote: post #39
guelo wrote: post #29

In the US the average worker works 1,777 hours per year, in Norway it's 1,328. That's a lot of extra time for family, friends, hobbies, etc. They've made a choice about their work/life balance and we (or our capitalist masters) have made a choice about what is important to us. How much salary would you give up in exchange for 25% less time at work? Also, the Norwegian bottom 10% makes twice as much as the American bo…

> or our capitalist masters This is why I flag stories like this.

Because you don't believe that there are rich people in the US profiting from exploiting the poor, or indeed that that is the innate structure of capitalism?

Not quite sure what you meant, be less flippant and more explicit please.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#82

Post by elblanco »

potatolicious wrote: post #57
electromagnetic wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a testament to the differences between perception and reality. The NHS in the UK regularly gets poor ratings, in fact they're regularly flat out abysmal on national satisfaction scales, yet all out-patient questionnaire's regularly return with satisfaction rates >90%. People perceive the NHS as this behemoth incapable of performing, but the reality is that it performs amazingly well and provides one of the best…

" Yet respondents states that Canadians dislike America on a whole more since Obama took office than before, and that Canadians feel less safe visiting the US than before." Funny you mention that. I just took a train tonight from Vancouver Canada, to Seattle WA. The difference between the two places for night and day, and what you just said sums it up perfectly. When I got on the train on the Canadian side, the stree…

Funny, you just described my exact experience going from Washington D.C. (one of the Murder leaders in the U.S.) and then later from NYC to Toronto.

At least in D.C./NYC the homeless people can play music in the metro/subway. And you really don't find too many of them unless you go to the absolute crappiest part of town. In Toronto it was hard to walk more than a block or two in broad daylight without getting accosted by some drug addled homeless person wanting McDonald's money. And we're talking about places like around Queen's Park and the St. James Park area.

I also call B.S. on your Seattle description (but not your Vancouver description which is a very nice city). Last time I was in downtown Seattle I think I saw maybe 2 or 3 homeless people. And my threat level was darn near 0 compared to an average day in D.C.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#83

Post by pbhjpbhj »

Adam503 wrote: post #62
anamax wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So on that count Americans do appear to be richer, assuming of course they are getting equal average amounts of education and healthcare on their private purchases as the Europeans are getting on their tax dollars. That assumption is rather dodgy on a couple of points. One is that a lot of healthcare and education in the US is tax-supported. Another is that a rational person may choose to spend money on things othe…

The author of that so-called "cancer survival rates" BS is Betsy McCaughey, the woman who invented the "death panels" nonsense. Here's link to webpage with video of John Stewart unloading on Betsy McCaughey for 2 entire segments of the Daily Show because of the "death panels" http://www.mediaite.com/tv/finally-jon-stewart-gives-betsy-m...

OK, we heard you already - you don't need to spam the comments with the same thing quite so many times.

I'm in the UK and this is the first I heard about "death panels". I looked at the top listing in the NYT and on ABC, as returned by Google, in order to get a definition.

Surely any country with limited healthcare resources requires someone (maybe a panel) to decide where to restrict application of resources. In many cases this failure to provide infinite resources to any health problem will result in premature death. So you could call the panels deciding on restricting care "death panels".

There's nothing controversial about that, is there. We have such panels in the UK, the only controversial part is that location within the UK gets factored in ("postcode lottery") when we are supposed to have a "national health service".

Some drugs and treatments are too expensive for the public purse.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#84

Post by wheels »

fnid wrote: post #24

First of all, averages aren't that significant. What are the numbers on the median? Furthermore, what about debt? How much credit card debt do Americans have relative to Europeans? When I lived there, almost no one even had a credit card. They spent money they had . This is really a very bad picture of the situation. I spent a lot of time in a lot of places in Europe from Italy to the arctic circle and from spain to…

Actually it's not just that averages are bad indicators -- the examples that he chose are obviously hand picked to make his case -- which to a knowledgeable reader destroys the credibility of the article in which he does most likely have a valid point.

For example he picks a mixed drink as a buying power indicator, but Norway has an off the charts "sin tax" on alcohol, which has little to do with the buying power for, say, a burger.

Perceptions of quality of life are always skewed by the attitude of the perceiver: you being on vacation, or the author being sick of Norway, for example.

I think the real thesis of the article is that there's a gap between Norway's perception of its own wealth and actual buying power, which really hit home for me when I interviewed for a job there (and ended up moving to Germany instead).

The more deeper seated cultural values, notably between how the wealth of a society is measured, are naturally harder to measure analytically. My theory (having grown up in the US and spent most of my adult life in Europe) is that the US is a society that is more "hero" driven -- and people that "make it" are more rewarded across the spectrum, whereas Europe tends to focus on a well-functioning welfare state. As a result, the American version of poverty is rare in most western european countries, but society is also less structured for empowering individuals. Both have their up and downsides.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#85

Post by davidw »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #81
davidw wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or our capitalist masters This is why I flag stories like this.

Because you don't believe that there are rich people in the US profiting from exploiting the poor, or indeed that that is the innate structure of capitalism? Not quite sure what you meant, be less flippant and more explicit please.

Because that sort of discussion is simply not germane to this site, and especially not facile treatments such as "our capitalist masters".

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#86

Post by tptacek »

Adam503 wrote: post #54
hop wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lets not take it out of perspective - no one will starve here, this isn't Uganda, and Domino's has $5 Pizzas.

Then I guess this story from ABC Chicago is a big lie, and the food bank is really just gonna buy $5 Dominos pizzas for everyone? "CHICAGO (WLS) -- A food pantry on Chicago's far South Side says it has run out of food to help the needy. The Greater Chicago Food Depository says food banks throughout the city are in desperate need of donations. The economic downturn is making it harder for many to feed their families.…

What does a failing charity have to do with the cost of living in Chicago, or the US as a whole?

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#87

Post by scotch_drinker »

masklinn wrote: post #64
coffeemug wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't feel the need to consume-consume-consume, and we certainly aren't brainwashed. This is really uncalled for - we do like a certain standard of living, but it doesn't mean we're brainwashed consumption machines born to satisfy an economic purpose as laid out by the federal reserve. Yes, most of my friends have playstations, flat screen TVs, and leased cars. Some of this stuff is financed by debt. But they do l…

> This is really uncalled for - we do like a certain standard of living, but it doesn't mean we're brainwashed consumption machines […] > > Yes, most of my friends have playstations, flat screen TVs, and leased cars. See? That's how brainwashing works: you don't realize it. That's the point.

And it's just as easy to say that Europeans have been brainwashed to say things like all Americans are brainwashed to consume, consume, consume. It's a highly condescending argument on several levels to make sweeping statements like that about people who have different motivations for doing what they do.

We might as well all be brainwashed, there's no proving we're not if that's your argument.

The original poster in this thread was being insulting and condescending. There's no other way to look at it, whether he meant to or not.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#88

Post by scotch_drinker »

yardie wrote: post #71
coffeemug wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't feel the need to consume-consume-consume, and we certainly aren't brainwashed. This is really uncalled for - we do like a certain standard of living, but it doesn't mean we're brainwashed consumption machines born to satisfy an economic purpose as laid out by the federal reserve. Yes, most of my friends have playstations, flat screen TVs, and leased cars. Some of this stuff is financed by debt. But they do l…

You do realize the US has one of the highest debt to income ratios in the world. So while your friends aren't drowning in debt, the picture for the rest of the country doesn't look so rosey.

Got a link? It doesn't seem quite as clear cut as you paint it.

http://www.creditloan.com/blog/americans-debt-to-income-rati...

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#89

Post by scotch_drinker »

Adam503 wrote: post #59
michael_dorfman wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Scandinavia, drugs don't ensure that some people are poor. Some people choose to spend the $30 on drugs instead of pizza, of course-- but there really is no poverty here.

Let me ask again. Are you guys saying this video ABC report from Chicago about A food bank Chicago emptied of food is a lie? Do know that unemployment runs 70% among people with partial disabilities trying to find work? What do you think these perpetually unemployed partially disabled people are doing, living off their trust funds?

Just because this food bank doesn't have food doesn't mean there are millions of people starving in Chicago. There are a myriad of reasons for why the food bank might not have food, chief among them is that in a major recession like we have been experiencing, fewer people donate.

Do people exist in the US who are consistently hungry? Yes. Do they starve on a regular basis? No. It has nothing to do with whether your link is a lie or not.

Does unemployment run 70% among people with partial disabilities? I wouldn't be surprised at all to hear that 70% of people with partial disabilities who are trying to find work are unemployed. It doesn't sound like a particularly useful stat. I wouldn't be surprised to hear that 70% of all people who are trying to find work are unemployed. They are looking for work after all.

Re: We're Rich, You're Not. End of Story.

#90

Post by zackattack »

davidw wrote: post #85
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you don't believe that there are rich people in the US profiting from exploiting the poor, or indeed that that is the innate structure of capitalism? Not quite sure what you meant, be less flippant and more explicit please.

Because that sort of discussion is simply not germane to this site, and especially not facile treatments such as "our capitalist masters".

It absolutely is germane to this site. Many of us are entrepreneurs, hacking capitalism. I think that "capitalist masters" is actually a succinct treatment of the state of things in the US, and challenge you to better articulate the nature of things so concisely.
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