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I really don’t think 99.9% of people want to pay 1K /month for health insurance or be a missed paycheck away from living on the street. Americans make a lot of

I really don’t think 99.9% of people want to pay 1K /month for health insurance or be a missed paycheck away from living on the street. Americans make a lot of money but the cost of living is through the roof and there is practically no safety net. That’s not even touching on our complete lack of social and family support structures.

throwaway894345 5y ago
Again with the wild hyperbole. The American safety net may not be the absolute best in the world but it is still far better than what is available to the overwhelming majority of people. Indeed, a huge swath of the world is far below the American poverty line. Why do you suppose so many millions of people risk their lives to get into America in the first place? Come on. We can advocate for better healthcare and social services without going full “AmErIcA iS a ThIrD wOrLd CoUnTrY”.
- luffapi 5y ago
  It’s not hyperbole it’s reality. The US has the largest prison population in the world. It has massive problems with homelessness and violent crime. It has extreme wealth inequality. We have the most expensive healthcare and education in the world. The reality is that the US is a harsh place to live. Yes there are upsides but the hyperbole is that there aren’t significant downsides.
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    > Yes there are upsides but the hyperbole is that there aren’t significant downsides. The original claim was that the median American’s lifestyle is enviable to the overwhelming majority of people on Earth today or at any other point. In other words, the downsides are few and far less significant than the upsides for most people today or at any time in the past. It’s so exhausting to transparently argue that relative to the world, the US is a very nice place and suffer responses like “but there is lots of violent crime!” Of course there is always some referand for which the US has “lots of violent crime” but by world standards it does not. The US homicide rate for example is something like 30% below the global homicide rate. The poverty rate in the US is pretty comparable to European countries (bit worse than western Europe, bit better than eastern Europe) and far, far better than Asia, Africa, or South America. Even our wealth inequality is not “extreme” by global standards. There is no truth whatsoever to claims that the US is a harsh place to live. According to the quality of life index which does not cherry pick metrics, the US is 15th globally (lower is better). https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.j...
    - luffapi 5y ago
      The US has the 4th highest wealth inequality of any nation: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_inequality https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_... The #1 rate of incarceration (by far): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... The #1 healthcare costs (by far): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_h... There are a lot of problems here that you are glossing over.
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        Again, I'm not glossing over problems, I'm contextualizing them. I've been very clear about that in this entire thread. Cherry picking individual metrics doesn't present a clear picture, and I'm striving for a clear (not distorted) picture. Notably, healthcare costs don't mean much on their own, you have to adjust for per-capita wealth as well. With respect to wealth inequality, would you rather live in a country where almost everyone is below the poverty line or one in which almost everyone is above the poverty line but some moreso than others? Again, I want to reign in inequality in the US, but I don't need to invoke hyperbole to get there. You aren't going to get a clear picture by cherry picking statistics that support your conclusion. You need to contextualize. Of course, if your goal isn't to get a clear, honest picture then we're aiming for different things and we may as well part ways now. EDIT: From wikipedia, regarding measures of inequality: > Gini coefficients are simple, and this simplicity can lead to oversights and can confuse the comparison of different populations; for example, while both Bangladesh (per capita income of $1,693) and the Netherlands (per capita income of $42,183) had an income Gini coefficient of 0.31 in 2010,[53] the quality of life, economic opportunity and absolute income in these countries are very different, i.e. countries may have identical Gini coefficients, but differ greatly in wealth.
        luffapi 5y ago
        Your original argument is flawed. You actually have no way of knowing if most people are “envious” of the US. That’s pure speculation on your part. We can look at numbers, if we do we see some where the US looks really good and some where it looks really bad. That’s not even touching less tangible things like culture, community and family values (all of which are extremely subjective). The US is definitely a harsh place to live in many ways. And yes, I’ve lived in other countries and traveled extensively. I’ve seen plenty of poor (by American standards) families living happily together in ways that would make many Americans envious. In short, your claim is too subjective to be useful and is directly contradicted by multiple metrics.

throwaway894345 5y ago

Again with the wild hyperbole. The American safety net may not be the absolute best in the world but it is still far better than what is available to the overwhelming majority of people. Indeed, a huge swath of the world is far below the American poverty line. Why do you suppose so many millions of people risk their lives to get into America in the first place? Come on. We can advocate for better healthcare and social services without going full “AmErIcA iS a ThIrD wOrLd CoUnTrY”.

luffapi 5y ago
It’s not hyperbole it’s reality. The US has the largest prison population in the world. It has massive problems with homelessness and violent crime. It has extreme wealth inequality. We have the most expensive healthcare and education in the world. The reality is that the US is a harsh place to live. Yes there are upsides but the hyperbole is that there aren’t significant downsides.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  > Yes there are upsides but the hyperbole is that there aren’t significant downsides. The original claim was that the median American’s lifestyle is enviable to the overwhelming majority of people on Earth today or at any other point. In other words, the downsides are few and far less significant than the upsides for most people today or at any time in the past. It’s so exhausting to transparently argue that relative to the world, the US is a very nice place and suffer responses like “but there is lots of violent crime!” Of course there is always some referand for which the US has “lots of violent crime” but by world standards it does not. The US homicide rate for example is something like 30% below the global homicide rate. The poverty rate in the US is pretty comparable to European countries (bit worse than western Europe, bit better than eastern Europe) and far, far better than Asia, Africa, or South America. Even our wealth inequality is not “extreme” by global standards. There is no truth whatsoever to claims that the US is a harsh place to live. According to the quality of life index which does not cherry pick metrics, the US is 15th globally (lower is better). https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.jsp https://www.numbeo.com/quality-of-life/rankings_by_country.j...
  - luffapi 5y ago
    The US has the 4th highest wealth inequality of any nation: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_inequality https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_... The #1 rate of incarceration (by far): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... The #1 healthcare costs (by far): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_health_expenditure_per_capita https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_h... There are a lot of problems here that you are glossing over.
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      Again, I'm not glossing over problems, I'm contextualizing them. I've been very clear about that in this entire thread. Cherry picking individual metrics doesn't present a clear picture, and I'm striving for a clear (not distorted) picture. Notably, healthcare costs don't mean much on their own, you have to adjust for per-capita wealth as well. With respect to wealth inequality, would you rather live in a country where almost everyone is below the poverty line or one in which almost everyone is above the poverty line but some moreso than others? Again, I want to reign in inequality in the US, but I don't need to invoke hyperbole to get there. You aren't going to get a clear picture by cherry picking statistics that support your conclusion. You need to contextualize. Of course, if your goal isn't to get a clear, honest picture then we're aiming for different things and we may as well part ways now. EDIT: From wikipedia, regarding measures of inequality: > Gini coefficients are simple, and this simplicity can lead to oversights and can confuse the comparison of different populations; for example, while both Bangladesh (per capita income of $1,693) and the Netherlands (per capita income of $42,183) had an income Gini coefficient of 0.31 in 2010,[53] the quality of life, economic opportunity and absolute income in these countries are very different, i.e. countries may have identical Gini coefficients, but differ greatly in wealth.
      - luffapi 5y ago
        Your original argument is flawed. You actually have no way of knowing if most people are “envious” of the US. That’s pure speculation on your part. We can look at numbers, if we do we see some where the US looks really good and some where it looks really bad. That’s not even touching less tangible things like culture, community and family values (all of which are extremely subjective). The US is definitely a harsh place to live in many ways. And yes, I’ve lived in other countries and traveled extensively. I’ve seen plenty of poor (by American standards) families living happily together in ways that would make many Americans envious. In short, your claim is too subjective to be useful and is directly contradicted by multiple metrics.